Midtown Greenway Trail [not the transit thread]

[widin007]

This study is a legislative mandate and will include alternatives to collocating or repurposing the existing rail bridge. CPKC is likely going to repeat their no for collocation of a trail and existing single track on the bridge, but this study is discussing this extensively with CPKC staff and leadership, at the least there will be a definitive answer from CPKC rather than the guessing games that have happened until now. The study will include cost estimates to rehabbing the bridge for trail use (going to look a lot higher than previous estimated) and a potential new bridge. This study will also explore alternatives all the way through St Paul to Allianz Field including interim and permanent alignments. This study will go a lot further than anything else done for the crossing or the alignment in general. The previous studies done by the Greenway coalition were much smaller in scope and cost.

[minneboom]

More details on the options to extend the greenway.

https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/94 ... d62b5d3f3b

[BikesOnFilm]

From the looks of those cost estimates and CPKC pouring cold water on co-locating bikes and trains on the existing bridge, it looks like the most likely options are:

- This does not happen
- CPKC's customers along the Short Line dry up and they abandon the bridge
- President Buttigieg uses his two term tenure of federal stability to set up sustainable funding for active transportation grants and we somehow get an 80% federal funding match.

I'd love to believe we could get a no-frills, $30m bike bridge funded through a Dem trifecta in the state legislature, but that also feels like something that would be far down the priorities list considering how much federal funding is no longer available for critical needs like health care and housing.

[Mdcastle]

$30 million would be the cost to fix up the existing bridge if whatever the Soo Line is called nowadays allowed it, which they've now definatively said they will not. Also, isn't the Misssissippi River technically a national park or something and you aren't supposed to build new bridges across it, one of the issues that stalled the St. Croix Crossing for years?

[BikesOnFilm]

According to page 24 of the Bridge Options presentation in the above link, there are two new construction bridge options estimated at $30 million, and two additional ones at $34 million and $36 million.

And IIRC, it's not as much the national park system that is the big point of opposition to new bridges, but citizen conservation groups that have opposed them, specifically in the planning stage of the Riverview line.

[quagga]

$30-50 million is not a huge amount of money in the scheme of things, and $25-30M or so in a bonding bill is not outside the realm of possibility for a popular project supported by both Minneapolis and St. Paul legislators. At that point the counties/cities could probably collectively make up the gap. A standard street reconstruction project is already $8-10M/mile, and Hennepin has to be receiving something like $50-100M annually from the new metro active transportation sales tax.

[BikesOnFilm]

That's a much brighter perspective, I hope you're right!

[Wezle]

Now if only the timelines listed weren't 10-19 years out. Can't wait to ride across the bridge into St Paul in 2045 at the age of 47.

[twincitizen]

If we are going to spend $30-60 million on a new bridge no matter what, I would push for Option 3: Constructing a new truss superstructure for freight rail and trail usage supported by the existing piers of the Short Line Bridge.

This would avoid the environmental concerns with an additional bridge over the river and could be built more quickly than a new bridge since it would reuse the existing piers. And as a bonus for us futurist transit nerds, this would appear to be the most future-proof option to ensure this bridge could physically support future LRT/streetcar tracks after the freight usage ends.

[COLSLAW5]

If we are going to spend $30-60 million on a new bridge no matter what, I would push for Option 3: Constructing a new truss superstructure for freight rail and trail usage supported by the existing piers of the Short Line Bridge.

This would avoid the environmental concerns with an additional bridge over the river and could be built more quickly than a new bridge since it would reuse the existing piers. And as a bonus for us futurist transit nerds, this would appear to be the most future-proof option to ensure this bridge could physically support future LRT/streetcar tracks after the freight usage ends.

I think the idea of using the piers to construction the trail is pretty much out based on the documents. CPKC wont let any trail share the bridge and the reconstruction plans basically show the same thing as using the existing bridge.

In terms of the rest of the alignment into St. Paul they should get this figured out asap and then get MNDOT to pay for it as part of the I94 upgrades. Getting the trail built up to the bridge on the St. Paul side would still be useful and maybe provide more pressure to get the bridge built.

[BikesOnFilm]

In terms of the rest of the alignment into St. Paul they should get this figured out asap and then get MNDOT to pay for it as part of the I94 upgrades. Getting the trail built up to the bridge on the St. Paul side would still be useful and maybe provide more pressure to get the bridge built.

Agreed. The St. Paul alignment without a bridge means taking a jaunt to existing bridges to the north and south for a detour that isn’t insignificant but ultimately manageable.

The bridge without the St. Paul alignment would be a costly dead end that would be used in bad faith to slow future investments in bike infrastructure.

[Oreos&Milk]

From the looks of those cost estimates and CPKC pouring cold water on co-locating bikes and trains on the existing bridge, it looks like the most likely options are:

- This does not happen
- CPKC's customers along the Short Line dry up and they abandon the bridge
- President Buttigieg uses his two term tenure of federal stability to set up sustainable funding for active transportation grants and we somehow get an 80% federal funding match.

I'd love to believe we could get a no-frills, $30m bike bridge funded through a Dem trifecta in the state legislature, but that also feels like something that would be far down the priorities list considering how much federal funding is no longer available for critical needs like health care and housing.

naw.. Ai powered ciborgue clone President Trump would just veto it right before Invading Canada..

I'm gonna look like a genius in a few years when it all comes true.


I doubt they would just abandon it knowing others would have value for it..

I think focusing on a plan to buy it right as the value of the bridge for them lowers to such an extent it is no longer worth maintaining and keeping would be the best bet.

That paired with a covert group actively seeking ways to bankrupt those businesses that still use it that would make the need to keep it for the railroad... well.. that is just a joke ...of course..

[mattaudio]

That paired with a covert group actively seeking ways to bankrupt those businesses that still use it that would make the need to keep it for the railroad...

Reserving comment on how attached the rest of the comment is to reality, this suggestion isn't that far from reality. Wasn't City of Minneapolis actively looking at what it would take to purchase the properties of the existing rail customers on this spur into Minneapolis that is dependent upon the bridge?

[BikesOnFilm]

"Abandoning" in this context wouldn't mean leaving the bridge an unusable ruin. It means if CPKC no longer has customers to serve on the other end of the bridge and/or sees no future customers materializing (ie., all the industrial land along the line is rezoned to residential), they'll sell it to HCRRA to ditch the tax liability created by owning that track.

And I think this isn't too far off from what's slowly happening. I can't see the grain mill operating too much further into the future, right?

[DanPatchToget]

Granted these are two different rail lines, but I haven't seen any movement on purchasing the Ford Spur from CPKC for a trail, and then there's the unused portion of the Dan Patch Line in Burnsville and Lakeville that CPKC refuses to sell. Maybe for this particular rail line it could be different, but if* this line becomes unused it may not be as quick and easy to buy and convert to a trail as some may think.

*While traffic on this line definitely isn't what it used to be, that doesn't mean abandonment could be any day. I've seen rail lines that seem like they're on the brink of abandonment, but for years or even decades the railroad continues to use them.

[Silophant]

Similarly, right on the other side of downtown, BNSF is pretty adamant that they're holding on to their bridge forever to keep moving a couple carloads a week to and from Continental Cement.

[quagga]

And I think this isn't too far off from what's slowly happening. I can't see the grain mill operating too much further into the future, right?

ADM just put quite a lot of money into upgrading that mill unfortunately. No plans to vacate in the next several decades.

[mattaudio]

Anyone know what those mills actually do? Seems like it's grain storage and transload from truck to rail. Which makes me wonder how it's viable in the modern industrial era to truck grain into the center of a large metro for transload.

[Silophant]

The Atkinson Mill north of 38th is the last industrial flour mill in the city.