Green Line Extension - Southwest LRT

[HuskyGrad]

Why am I just now noticing how insanely shortsighted it is that this almost $3B project did not include a trail along the portion of the route stretching from Shady Oak Station to at least Golden Triangle Station, or even better to the end of the line. I offer the ending at Golden Triangle because from that point outward it is possible to use existing trails along Valley View Rd and Flying Cloud Dr to reach the last couple EP station areas. But for that middle portion of the route that is all brand new ROW, what the heck were they thinking not building a trail along the LRT tracks, especially on those long bridges and overpasses.

The answer is probably that this somehow would've cost $200 million.

Most of the right-of-way acquisitions were in Minnetonka and Eden Prairie.

[DanPatchToget]

A trail bridge over Excelsior Boulevard also would've been nice, and it would make the South Cedar Lake Trail free of road crossings from 5th Avenue in Hopkins to Cedar Lake Parkway and James Avenue on the Kenilworth Trail and Midtown Greenway respectively.

[Anondson]

Why am I just now noticing how insanely shortsighted it is that this almost $3B project did not include a trail along the portion of the route stretching from Shady Oak Station to at least Golden Triangle Station, or even better to the end of the line.

Among my many points of poor decisions, the elimination of the trail from the 62 tunnel underpass is still a cost cutting too far. Because then the tunnel underpass was built such that it is now impossible to add it back. It wasn’t even built wide enough to accommodate in the future. Flat out too narrow now.

Still fuming.

[mattaudio]

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 been nice to use the existing 62/212 split bridges to create a bus loop for the station serving FBRT on 169 and/or 62.
Anyways, three things that can redeem this station would be a strong connection southward, a ped/bike bridge over 62 to the extreme southern tip of Opus which has lots of redevelopment potential, and maybe a ped/bike bridge over 212 towards the original Best Buy HQ.

[Tom H.]

As long as we're complaining about design decisions...

EP Town Center station is directly adjacent to an apartment building, restaurant, and bowling alley. The driveway for that area almost serves as a street grid-type extension but the cul-de-sac by the station cuts vehicle traffic (and there is a little bit of a grade difference). I imagined that they would develop this access corrdior as it provides an easy connection from the station area to the nearby apartments and even the Walmart just across the next street, maybe installing some stairs or a pedestrian ramp.

eptc.png

...but no. Not only did they not design any pedestrian amenities to foster this connection, they in fact have installed a brand new fence to make it impossible to even create a desire path for this movement. Not sure what property owner was worried about pedestrians messing up their parking lot, but this is just an own goal.

[Bakken2016]

As long as we're complaining about design decisions...

EP Town Center station is directly adjacent to an apartment building, restaurant, and bowling alley. The driveway for that area almost serves as a street grid-type extension but the cul-de-sac by the station cuts vehicle traffic (and there is a little bit of a grade difference). I imagined that they would develop this access corrdior as it provides an easy connection from the station area to the nearby apartments and even the Walmart just across the next street, maybe installing some stairs or a pedestrian ramp.

eptc.png

...but no. Not only did they not design any pedestrian amenities to foster this connection, they in fact have installed a brand new fence to make it impossible to even create a desire path for this movement. Not sure what property owner was worried about pedestrians messing up their parking lot, but this is just an own goal.

When I went on a tour of the alignment last year, project staff told me the city of Eden Prairie does want to connect it all the way through with a future roadway project.

[Tom H.]

When I went on a tour of the alignment last year, project staff told me the city of Eden Prairie does want to connect it all the way through with a future roadway project.

That's actually really encouraging to hear. My pie-in-the-sky hope is that if the Walmart site were someday available for redevelopment, they could extend Commonwealth through there all the way to the Green Line station. I know Walmart does brisk business there, but if EP is serious about developing a real "town center" along Singletree (as I believe is the city's stated intention), it really starts and ends with that site.

[Anondson]

Hennepin is adding another round.

$100 M

https://www.startribune.com/hennepin-co ... 600337941/

[angrysuburbanite]

Say what you will about the locations of the stations, but they all look really nice. I love the new station pylons and signage, art/graphics (the unique art design at the ends of either platform was a nice touch), color schemes, and material choices. I hope whoever designed the stations gets hired again for the Blue Line extension, they did a good job.

[DanPatchToget]

Didn't read the whole article because I know how much KSTP loves to hate light rail, so the gist is there was a hiccup in which recently installed light rail track in the Kenilworth Corridor was one foot too close to the parallel freight track.

https://kstp.com/5-investigates/new-pro ... 21t5bSMGNI

[Bakken2016]

Didn't read the whole article because I know how much KSTP loves to hate light rail, so the gist is there was a hiccup in which recently installed light rail track in the Kenilworth Corridor was one foot too close to the parallel freight track.

https://kstp.com/5-investigates/new-pro ... 21t5bSMGNI

I think the freight rail has to move again once the tunnel is complete, I don’t think this is truly a problem.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Bakken2016]

Didn't read the whole article because I know how much KSTP loves to hate light rail, so the gist is there was a hiccup in which recently installed light rail track in the Kenilworth Corridor was one foot too close to the parallel freight track.

https://kstp.com/5-investigates/new-pro ... 21t5bSMGNI

I think the freight rail has to move again once the tunnel is complete, I don’t think this is truly a problem.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Actually the more I look at the area, I’m not sure

[Wezle]

I swear if someone sneezes on the light rail KSTP will write 3 articles about it. Hundreds of people die on Minnesota roadways each year and they may mention it as a footnote unless its a multiple fatality collision. But of course they'll never write it in a way that's critical of the driver or roadway design, it was just an unfortunate accident with no way to prevent it!

[angrysuburbanite]

In January, Alexander told Met Council members the estimated price of the 14.5 mile Southwest Light Rail had grown to $2.86 billion. That’s more than $197 million per mile.

What does this have to do with the problem at hand? News agencies really need to let go of the cost. It's no secret that transit projects are expensive in the US. It's too late to go back and change SWLRT now, ruminating on it like this is just stupid at this point. Go complain about that bridge in Duluth, won't that cost like 1.3 billion dollars? Oh wait, that's fine because cars are good!

But when crews recently laid the new light rail tracks at the crossing on West 21st Street, Collins and her neighbors measured the distance and found they were about one foot too close to the freight tracks.

Why are these people out measuring and monitoring the project like this in the first place? Seems kinda weird to me. Perhaps if they find a minor error they can give news outlets something to turn into another "Metropolitan Council wastes more money on a rolling drug den nobody will use, think of all of the other places this money could go" story? I'm getting tired of the NIMBYism and general negativity toward light rail (and transit in general) in the Twin Cities.

What a mess of an article, just get to the point of what happened without theatrics, missing information, and hyperbole. I have never read a KSTP article before, and I never intend to again.

end rant.

[Mdcastle]

Building the tracks in the wrong place is a "minor error?"

[thespeedmccool]

Didn't read the whole article because I know how much KSTP loves to hate light rail, so the gist is there was a hiccup in which recently installed light rail track in the Kenilworth Corridor was one foot too close to the parallel freight track.

https://kstp.com/5-investigates/new-pro ... 21t5bSMGNI

We 100% should NOT pay to fix this. It would somehow be a $100 million problem to move the freight rails 7 inches. I can't believe there are people with no better way to spend their time then walk onto active construction sites and check up on contractors work.

It's also not clear from the article if the Met Council just vaguely promised a 25-foot gap and designed a 24-foot-and-5-inch gap, or if it was actually engineered to be a 25-foot gap and was built wrong.

Either way, I don't care. Reporting on this is like reporting that a state accountant forgot to carry a 2 and underestimated the cost of a program by 0.01%. We need to set more reasonable expectations that construction projects are sometimes complicated and not every minor chnage is a scandal-level event.

[angrysuburbanite]

Building the tracks in the wrong place is a "minor error?"

I mean, relative to the other problems SWLRT has faced. I don’t think this is a super huge deal, the contractor screwed up, they have to fix it. Problem solved. (Fingers crossed it’s that easy)

This is not a super earth-shattering issue worthy of a headline news story, things like this happen on projects of this scale!

[commissioner]

I have a theory on this: Residents of Kenworth are still pissed about the light rail going in so they will do anything to make it look bad, also KSTP has been anti light rail since the green line went in (if not before) and like the residents of Kenworth, will do anything to make it look bad.. Combine these two and you get what's happening. Did someone screw up, probably. But is it the death of the project that both Kenworth and KSTP want it to be? No, but they want us to think that.

[Korh]

Maybe I'm jaded but I don't see the point in even bothering with these articles. There just there to farm clicks for people that already had a bone to pick with the lrt, I doubt it swayed anyone from the pro to anti camp
Same can be said with pro lrt/transit to an extent, specifically ones that are along the lines "proposed route to connect A and B could be ready in 3 years" or "why this car policy is bad" etc.
Like I said just farming clicks, not actually putting forward anything useful.

[UrsusUrbanicus]

I swear if someone sneezes on the light rail KSTP will write 3 articles about it.

Glad I'm not the only one who feels this way. I'm starting to suspect KSTP is secretly owned by a group of exurban landowners, right on the fringe of current development, who'd be in line for a huge payday if their site became home to the next "Lennar at Majestic Rolling Hills Vista" or "Pulte Kingsfield PheasantView Crescent at Wistful Meadow". Gotta exploit that fear of an urban planet!!

Yes, like any big city, Minneapolis and St. Paul have some problems. But they're nowhere near as bad as the major media make them out to be with their gawker-outrage hit jobs.