Green Line Extension - Southwest LRT

[woofner]

Minneapolis is not going to stand in the way of knocking out a few dozen (extremely nice) townhouses if it put the whole line in jeopardy.

The townhouses themselves do not matter as much as who lives in them. The CIDNA neighborhood has many residents with deep pockets and seemingly a recurring direct deposit transaction into the DFL coffers. I could see them persuading some councilmembers that their campaign fund is more important than this infrastructure project, which could certainly wait until after their retirement from politics.

[MNdible]

Assuming the technical issues are a wash or close to it, doesn’t it just make more sense to consolidate the rail line in SLP? First, this was the deal that everybody agreed to way back when. And second, isn’t it better to have one modestly used freight corridor rather than two lightly used ones?

[David Greene]

Assuming the technical issues are a wash or close to it, doesn’t it just make more sense to consolidate the rail line in SLP? First, this was the deal that everybody agreed to way back when. And second, isn’t it better to have one modestly used freight corridor rather than two lightly used ones?

All things being equal, I would say yes. However, I don't think things are necessarily equal.

I took a tour of the spur in question with the Safety in the Park folks. They do have some legitimate concerns. The one the stuck out to me is how the current rail alignment effectively blocks three roads at once if a train is long enough. That does create some emergency vehicle access problems. Given that freight traffic would increase, I don't think this concern can simply be dismissed.

A realignment of the tracks would help but it would be more expensive and as we've seen it destroys the school's football field and results in a number of other takings.

They also are concerned about noise given that the engines in the front of a long train will have to be run pretty hot to pull that train up the incline near Louisiana. I've been in an apartment building above flat freight tracks when a smallish train went by. We couldn't hear each other in the same room.

Finally, the current alignment has some pretty significant curves near the high school. There are sightline concerns and those big trains don't stop on a dime.

This alignment really is not currently built to handle long trains with moderate frequency. The Kenilworth corridor, on the other hand, is designed to handle such things. So I think the SLP residents have a good point when they question why we would move this rail traffic off a corridor that supports it onto a corridor that doesn't.

That said, I need to learn more. I'm hopeful that Thursday's joint BAC/CAC meeting will be informative.

[Tom H.]

I have a question for someone who may know more about the bus operations planned along the Washington Ave Transit Mall:

How will the 16 run along the WATM? The bus bumpouts remain between the bridges on the western edge of the mall, but for the remainder of the mall, it's just a two-lane street. Many of the fliers at local businesses in Stadium Village show the tracks as "LRT/Bus" on the cross-sectional diagrams. Will the buses run on the tracks, or along the auxiliary lanes? Those lanes are usually marked as "Bike / Emergency vehicle" lanes in the diagrams.

There are also no bus stop facilities along the mall (shelters, signs, bumpouts, etc.). The Central Corridor Bus Improvement Plan lists the West Bank station as a transfer point between Green Line and Route 16, but I'm not sure how the buses would let people on or off at the station. With right-side exit doors, the buses would need to cross over like at the 46th St BRT station, creating quite the safety headache with oncoming LRT vehicles.

I just can't figure out how this is going to work in my head. This will only be exacerbated by the fact that not only will the 16 be running along the mall, but many of the SWT and MVTA express buses will likely utilize the mall as well.

[VAStationDude]

Outside of late night/early morning when Green Line is not running, the 16 will not run on the Washington Avenue Mall. It will start at the West Bank station, go down University until Marion, serve St Paul College and housing along Marion, enter downtown on Kellog Blvd and run down 6th street east of Smith. I'm not sure what the plan is for commuter buses but I imagine there will be some consolidation and students will be expected to transfer to/from the Green Line to reach Downtown commuter buses rather than commuter buses serving the campus directly.

[Tcmetro]

Met Council actually just released an RFP for new stops at Coffman Union and Harvard Street. All the detoured routes (2, 16 owl, 110, 111, 113, 114, 115, 118, 252, 272, 355U, 465, 475, 579, 652, 695, 698, and the campus shuttles) will return to Washington Ave.

I wonder if the U is going to shorten the Campus Connector buses are not. It seems like it could save a lot of money, but would also be inconvenient for students.

Probably better to discuss this in the CCLRT thread too.

[woofner]

The proposed LRT crossing at Louisiana under this scenario is an at-grade crossing, as are the two crossings of Oxford.

Curious where you got this info. It makes sense, given all the sections depict the freight rail as elevated. Too bad though, given that the freight rail would not be able to take advantage of the speed increases made possible by grade separation in this case, whereas the LRT could. Also I'm assuming that an at-grade LRT alignment would require two at grade trail crossings, which sucks. Then presumably the trail access to Louisiana would happen on the south side through a new ramp.

I'd think that there will need to be a pretty huge rewrite of the Historic Resources section of the DEIS, given that the reroute will now require takings of half of the "park" referred to in the name St Louis Park.

[David Greene]

I'd think that there will need to be a pretty huge rewrite of the Historic Resources section of the DEIS, given that the reroute will now require takings of half of the "park" referred to in the name St Louis Park.

Which park is that? I can't see it on the maps.

[papazim]

The initial station layouts for Louisiana (as well as Beltline, West Lake, and 21st Street) will be rolled out at tonight's joint BAC/CAC meeting at Benilde-St. Margaret's.

Right now the main trail would remain up on the elevated section with freight and access would continue to be to the north via the Sam's Club parking lot to Louisiana Ave.

[David Greene]

Just got back from the CAC/BAC meeting. My takeaways, which almost certainly are not the same as others' takeaways:

- Everyone was really on their best behavior. I was very impressed with the tone of the discussion.

- The relocation alignment in the DEIS is unworkable for the railroads. Thus Brunswick West/Central are the relocation options moving forward.

- Relocation further west was looked at by the county and dismissed for some reason (no one there was around when those studies were done).

- TC&W/CP don't like relocation further west because it means there would be more wait time for their trains to get on the BNSF line.

- It's frustrating that the freight rail companies seem to be dictating a lot of this.

- No matter which co-location option is taken (at grade, tunnels, elevated), the exact same properties are taken.

- The freight companies will likely insist on at least 25' clearance on each side from the rail centerline to any other structure. That's what's driving the takings in the co-location option. The current clearance is much less but that was agreed to on a temporary basis. Co-location would make the Kenilworth freight line permanent and thus require the 25' clearance.

- Everyone I talked to thought the Louisiana station relocation is the right thing to do.

- The existing berms through St. Louis Park would be greatly raised in a relocation scenario. The SLP people really didn't like that.

- We will have cost estimates next month!

My gut feeling is that the decision is going to be determined by cost and that colocation will be the only affordable option. I talked to a few disinterested parties and they seemed to agree.

[Tcmetro]

Thanks for going to the meeting, David.

I have a feeling that the price is going to rise. There are a lot of viaducts that will be included in the project as well as the freight relocation, which I think will become quite expensive.

[David Greene]

One of the things driving the relocation of the Louisiana station is a belief that it would increase ridership. I really question that. Even relocated, the station is pretty far away from the actual hospital building (the closest structure is a parking ramp). The expectation is that the hospital shuttle would serve the relocated station. But I don't see why the same shuttle wouldn't also serve a station a bit further north.

Apparently the station location will have to shift from the DEIS due to freight interference issues. It's just a matter of how far south it has to go.

I think the relocated station opens up more redevelopment potential but they can't use that to improve ridership numbers.

[mattaudio]

Is it too late to add this added expense to the line item for "Hiawatha Avenue Freewayification" ??? That's really what caused it and where the cost increases belong.

[RailBaronYarr]

I'm not trying to beat a dead horse and come here and extol the virtues of 3C, but are these realignment, viaduct, etc costs already taken in to account for the LPA chosen route? I'm sure there were estimates as I seem to remember reading in the study that this was a foreseen issue, but how close were they? Would it make the 3C any more enticing from a cost perspective?

[David Greene]

I'm not trying to beat a dead horse and come here and extol the virtues of 3C, but are these realignment, viaduct, etc costs already taken in to account for the LPA chosen route? I'm sure there were estimates as I seem to remember reading in the study that this was a foreseen issue, but how close were they? Would it make the 3C any more enticing from a cost perspective?

Costs were estimated and we will see if those estimates hold up. It's not unusual for such costs to rise a bit. That's why the project has a contingency budget.

As I recall, the DEIS has colocation sightly more costly than relocation, but that was before the rail companies had their say and put the kibosh on the DEIS relocation plans.

It would take a huge miscalculation to suddenly make 3C the less expensive option.

I expect the costs to deal with freight will rise a bit, possibly complicating things on the Eden Prairie end to stay within budget.

My guess is that Minneapolis will accept colocation with some contingencies and mitigations, which will undoubtedly include assurances that all Minneapolis stations stay as part of the project.

But now I'm speculating far too much into the future.

[David Greene]

Is it too late to add this added expense to the line item for "Hiawatha Avenue Freewayification" ??? That's really what caused it and where the cost increases belong.

Bingo.

It frustrates me to no end that Mn/DOT and other agencies get to shift their road costs onto transit projects. Central Corridor is another example of this. University Ave. needed a complete rebuild anyway and it makes perfect sense from a cost perspective to do that at the same time the LRT is built. However, because we chose the fiscally responsible thing to do, the county got to shift that road cost onto the LRT project.

[mattaudio]

So colocation can't be used as a way to axe the 21st St station? #lookingforasilverlining

[David Greene]

It would take a huge miscalculation to suddenly make 3C the less expensive option.

And the project would have to start from scratch. Since 3C wasn't the LPA they'd have to go back to square one.

And lose their place in the federal queue.

This is also why the project can't look at relocation further west.

[David Greene]

So colocation can't be used as a way to axe the 21st St station? #lookingforasilverlining

I want to emphasize that colocation is far from a done deal. This is all pure speculation on my part based on the information presented last night.

As for the 21st station, what's so bad about it, really? I know that some vocal people in the neighborhood don't want it due to "those people" coming in.

I think it will be interesting to see if the ridership numbers at this station pan out.

[Viktor Vaughn]

It would take a huge miscalculation to suddenly make 3C the less expensive option.

You mean like if there was a typo that underestimated the cost of co-location by $100 million?