This is a big week for transportation planning in and around St. Paul. Think Seventh Street streetcar, Snelling Avenue BRT, Southwest Corridor, Gateway Corridor, Rush Line, and Minnesota High-Speed Rail.
7th STREET STREETCAR
On Wednesday, the St. Paul City Council will vote on a possible streetcar study that would further plans for a streetcar along four miles of Seventh Street, from Arcade to Randolph Avenue.
Fans and foes of the idea are already squaring off. More about the study is here, with some background here.
THE SNELLING AVENUE “A” LINE
Around the same time on Wednesday, the Metropolitan Council will vote on whether to proceed station locations for the A-Line, a bus rapid transit project that would travel along Snelling Avenue and Ford Parkway. The line, which is fully funded but has not entered final design, would link 46th Street station in Minneapolis to Roseville.
Though it’s not as controversial as light rail or streetcars, not everyone is happy — in fact, Stoltz Cleaners is pretty steamed about inheriting a planned bus stop. ( ADDENDUM: Looks like the Met Council has agreed to move the bus stop, but is still negotiating a few feet of right-of-way with the cleaners…)
THE SOUTHWEST LINE
Wednesday is also a big day for the Southwest Line, an extension of the Green Line that would travel from downtown Minneapolis to Eden Prairie. Met Council Chair Susan Haigh will convene a meeting of the Southwest Corridor Management Committee at 10 a.m. Wednesday to review a tentative configuration agreement with the city of Minneapolis, and the full Met Council will take up the preliminary project scope and revised budget again at 4 p.m. the same day.
The new Southwest LRT plan, which is about $30 million cheaper than the old one, was negotiated with the help of the Honorable Arthur J. Boylan. More information is at the end of this blog.
TRANSIT EQUITY PLAN
Also Wednesday, the Met Council will take up a draft of the new “transit equity” plan, which calls for more public transit investment in areas of racially-concentrated poverty into the year 2040.
In addition to bus rapid transit and light rail investment, the plan calls for new bus shelters at 75 new bus stops, and replacement of 75 old bus shelters at existing stops. The news release states: “On an average weekday, 50,000 people board Metro Transit from RCAPs. This comprises nearly 40% of all regional boardings.”
Three more meetings are planned for Thursday, July 10, pertaining to rail issues. So make sure your car is full of gas, because they’re a bit spread apart…
HIGH SPEED RAIL TO CHICAGO
First, the Minnesota High-Speed Rail Commission will meet at 10 a.m. Thursday at the Goodhue County Government Center to talk high-speed rail. They’re looking at a river route to Chicago.
RUSH LINE
The Rush Line Corridor Task Force is looking for a communications consultant to guide public outreach for the next year. A pre-bid meeting is scheduled for 11 a.m. Thursday in the Gateway Room at Union Depot, 214 4th St. E. Though work is presently focused on the St. Paul-to-Forest Lake leg, the task force’s ultimate vision is for an 80-mile corridor from St. Paul’s Union Depot to Hinckley, Minn.
GATEWAY CORRIDOR
The Gateway Corridor Commission meets at 3:30 p.m. Thursday in Woodbury City Hall. (A policy advisory committee will discuss the Gateway Draft Environmental Impact Statement at the same location at 2 p.m.) Plans call for a transit corridor from St. Paul to Woodbury, if not all the way to Eau Claire, Wis.
SOUTHWEST LINE PART II
As for the Southwest Light Rail Transit line mentioned above, here’s some key points in the tentative agreement between the Met Council and Minneapolis, which still has a ways to go to become official:
A) The Minneapolis portion of the Southwest Light Rail Corridor will be redesigned to remove the light rail tunnel north of the water channel connecting Cedar Lake and Lake of the Isles.
B) The 21st Street Station will be added back.
C) The city will get its requested pedestrian-access, noise mitigation, landscape restoration and other improvements along the portion of the corridor in Minneapolis.
Now, about that freight corridor… According to the news release, the city of Minneapolis and the Met Council tentatively agreed to a second memorandum of understanding “that commits the Met Council to work closely with the City and the Hennepin County Regional Railroad Authority to ensure that the Kenilworth freight corridor remains in public ownership, which the parties agree will decrease the chances that freight trains will increase in frequency or carry more dangerous cargo through the corridor.”
Minneapolis Mayor Betsy Hodges sounded resigned but none-too-pleased in the same news release:
“The City of Minneapolis has always strongly supported the vision for Southwest LRT,” said Mayor Hodges. “Our support now comes at a high cost – an unexpected and unwelcome cost – because freight was supposed to be removed. Governor Dayton is correct: the Kenilworth Corridor will not be the same. It could have been far worse, however, if not for the protections secured in this tentative agreement. With freight staying in the corridor, and given the constraints we face, this is the most responsible way to get the project built.
“I expect that and understand why residents along the Kenilworth corridor will be disappointed, but the greater good demands that we seek a path for Southwest LRT to move forward,” continued Mayor Hodges.
If approved by both sides, the Met Council’s revised budget for Southwest light rail will be reduced by $30 million, from $1.683 billion to $1.653 billion.
The city of Minneapolis will host a public meeting on the plan tonight, July 8, followed by a public hearing on municipal consent on August 19. The city council will vote on municipal consent at its regular meeting on August 29.
The Met Council will meet at 4 p.m. Wednesday to consider approving the new preliminary project scope and budget, with a joint public hearing with the Hennepin County Regional Railroad Authority planned for August 13 — another key date for public input. The county will vote August 19.
GREEN LINE DEBATE CONTINUES
There’s been some interesting discussion at the urban planning blog Streets.Mn assessing the new Green Line. In a lengthy, detailed post, one blogger calls it a “fiasco” and “dismal failure” because travel times from Minneapolis to St. Paul are running around 51 minutes.
(The same blogger acknowledges that train cars — which already carry more passengers than the Blue Line, at least in Week 2 of operation — will likely be full of passengers by the year 2030, but the Scoop digresses here: “It seems even the planners anticipate operation of only fifteen years or less until the Green Line is seriously overcrowded.”)
Another writer posts a lengthy Q-and-A about the one thing that could make the light rail a speedier trip from end-to-end — better signal prioritization. It seems the kinks in the city-owned traffic signals are still being worked out.
