urbanMSP

I've said it before, but the easiest way to get rail service from MSP to Rochester is via Owatonna. This would increase travel time (driving St. Paul to Rochester is 1:15, but going via Owatonna bumps it to 1:50) but Owatonna, Faribault, and Northfield may be slight trip generators. Lots of options ...

That's a little extreme. This feels like another manifestation of a problem I see everywhere, that cities, chambers, and boosters are all about getting and supporting any funding request no matter how valid or useful.

Weird transport grifts/vaporware to Rochester are almost expected at this point.
Weird endorsement quote from Bloomington's city manager was the actual shocker to me in that article. Yikes.

If it counts for anything, the idea to move the bus facility from Gateway to this project was brought up to some local WF folks involved with the deal who ensured me the concept would get to Sherman and others. But this was now a few years ago and I can prod again.

The op expense of a non-automated train, the capacity of a big bus. Will this one be stuck behind a Toyota Matrix like the renderings of the one-time Nicollet-Central streetcar plan in Minneapolis?

Train length is another issue... Will these stations only be built for 1-LRV trains?
Hiawatha was built with some 2-LRV platforms but with a pathway to extend those platforms (happened within a few years).

If they do add the ability to use a normal credit/debit, is there any reason to keep the original go-to card around? Wouldn't it be annoying to have lots of small transactions on a credit card statement, or *particularly* a checking account statement? It's so much nicer to have fewer, larger transa...

What ever happened to connecting the Fort Road bridge to Shepard Road instead of W 7th?

Biden in Duluth/Superior tomorrow to do his second boast in two years about supporting the Blatnik Bridge project - I can't imagine Amtrak Joe will be announcing anything about NLX during the visit?

Yeah City West station feels like it will be a dud. The only thing it can serve well is the UHG/Optum campus, and even that's not close. This looks like it won't even have a trail south from the station to the older City West Pwky development closer to Shady Oak/212. I always thought it would have b...

Bumping my suggestion from a decade ago to ditch the express fare and instead use GoTo and other means to convert free parking to paid. Thus if you take the 94, or get dropped off at a major park & ride, it would be a local fare. But if you park at a park & ride, it would be a local fare + p...

We could've been a real city:

But look at that bridge up the hill connecting Penn Ave to Franklin Ave - that would be a useful connection.

the park board and NIMBY's cost us $1.5b and 10 years because they didn't like bikers in their view. It's literally been a conservative meme for the last decade about how we should have "just moved the damn bike trail" and I had always thought there was a sound technical reason not to. Th...

Developer seems honest about it...

Hogan called the plan for the third tower, which will be built last and its height ultimately determined by market demand and financing, “aspirational.”

So do they throw down the future arcology card to help get city approval or something?

It wouldn't be unprecedented. When the Blue Line opened in 2004, the initial service was downtown to Ft. Snelling Station since the airport tunnel was not yet complete.

1,750 ft supertall, second tallest in U.S., proposed. June and Retiredbanker unavailable for comment. https://www.oklahoman.com/story/news/2023/12/18/developer-to-build-2nd-tallest-building-in-the-us-for-okc-apartments/71937684007/ https://www.oklahoman.com/gcdn/authoring/authoring-images/2023/12/15...

If anything the "one week per quarter" thing gives me the impression they ***don't intend*** to have people come back on a regular, consistent basis (which is fine IMO). My company is remote-first, and we generally do the same thing for on-sites/strategy sessions. 1-2x per year for the ent...

Has there been any proposal to have any kind of rail their downtown in the past 30 years?

Probably just me in the fantasy thread: viewtopic.php?p=153485

Doomsday preppers want old trucks before computer-controlled engines (EMP hardened) running on diesel (easier to bulk store for long term without degradation). And not just one bug-out truck, but a menu of vehicle options to survive different scenarios.
Or so I've heard...

So they've looked at a viaduct over the CR 81 viaduct to get the station on the North Memorial side of the intersection, and they've looked at leaving it at grade under the CR81 viaduct. But why not just have a station at the same level as the CR81 viaduct with vertical circulation on each side?