Blue Line Extension - Bottineau LRT

[twincitizen]

60% design plans have been published for all sections of the line, except for the redesigned Lowry Station which will be out later this year: https://metrocouncil.org/Transportation ... ering.aspx

1. After looking at the design for Washington Ave from 10th Ave to Broadway, I restate my earlier comment:

I hope there's appetite among the project planners for a new study comparing running on Washington as planned vs. running up the east side of I-94's ROW or along 2nd St or the freight rail ROW to reach 21st. Washington Ave could possibly be the worst/slowest of those options due to the heavy traffic and freeway exit ramp complications.

Running it from 10th Ave straight onto the RR corridor behind the Strib printing plant and up to 21st would speed things up quite a bit by avoiding crossing Plymouth and Broadway at-grade. With the Strib printing plant closing, that option suddenly becomes viable. The only other freight rail customer south of Broadway appears to be the scrapyard or whatever that is between 14th & 17th, and that property would seem very likely to redevelop if LRT is coming, meaning the freight trackage could be removed even further north, freeing up this spur ROW from Strib all the way to 21st Avenue where LRT would head west over I-94.

2. Less significantly, I don't think "West Broadway Station" is the ideal name for that one. The Lyndale Avenue Station will most closely serve the commercial heart of West Broadway, while "West Broadway Station" is actually east of 94. "Washington & Broadway Station" would be a better choice here.

3. Crazy thought, but would it be possible to remove some/all of the freeway connections at Broadway? If it could be done, replacement I-94 ramps could go in a traditional diamond interchange at 26th Ave N. Not ideal for truck traffic, but it would really improve the Washington & Broadway Station environment. Dreaming even harder, this would open up the possibility of capping 94 between Plymouth and Broadway.

[RoundaboutMan22]

My gosh, I feel like the station at Bass Lake Road looks worse and worse every time I see it rendered.

[Bakken2016]

My gosh, I feel like the station at Bass Lake Road looks worse and worse every time I see it rendered.

I'm only seeing roll plots, am I missing something?

[Wezle]

Is the curb protected bikeway on 2nd St N from Hennepin to Plymouth new? I don't recall seeing it in earlier versions of the project.

[blo442]

Is the curb protected bikeway on 2nd St N from Hennepin to Plymouth new? I don't recall seeing it in earlier versions of the project.

Minneapolis has snuck in a lot of bike/pedestrian focused work - savvy negotiation by City planning staff using the threat of denying municipal consent to get the county/feds to pay for a lot of city priorities. (If the FTA CIG program still exists going forward...)
One cool thing I noticed recently is that the northbound E Line station at Hennepin and 2nd St N has a curb ramp built in for the future two-way bikeway crossing Hennepin. Actual coordination and forward thinking in municipal government for once!

[rhettcarlson]

Is the curb protected bikeway on 2nd St N from Hennepin to Plymouth new? I don't recall seeing it in earlier versions of the project.

One cool thing I noticed recently is that the northbound E Line station at Hennepin and 2nd St N has a curb ramp built in for the future two-way bikeway crossing Hennepin. Actual coordination and forward thinking in municipal government for once!

So that's why it's extra wide? First I'm hearing about a two way crossing of on Hennepin. Are there plans out there?

[Bakken2016]

https://engage.publiccoordinate.com/en/ ... 2025/embed

An interactive map with more visualizations.

[blo442]

7th St N reconstruction project (between Target Field and I-94) resurfaces at the BAC next week after years of radio silence, with the news that the reconstruction project will be fully subsumed into the Blue Line Extension construction package. Also a peek at the layout which appears to include sidewalk level bike lanes, bus lanes in both directions, and consolidation of the C and D Line BRT stations to new/expanded platforms near the 5th St intersection.
https://lims.minneapolismn.gov/download ... ercent.pdf

[Bakken2016]

7th St N reconstruction project (between Target Field and I-94) resurfaces at the BAC next week after years of radio silence, with the news that the reconstruction project will be fully subsumed into the Blue Line Extension construction package. Also a peek at the layout which appears to include sidewalk level bike lanes, bus lanes in both directions, and consolidation of the C and D Line BRT stations to new/expanded platforms near the 5th St intersection.
https://lims.minneapolismn.gov/download ... ercent.pdf

Where does it show consolidated stations for the C and D lines?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[blo442]

Where does it show consolidated stations for the C and D lines?

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

That's my interpretation of the yellow rectangles drawn in the boulevard in between 5th and 6th, combined with the new curb lines not lining up with the existing northbound or southbound C Line platforms. (I can't imagine they would just remove a station entirely without replacement)

[angrysuburbanite]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ccn35i2xE68
60% design animation of the whole corridor.

The 21st Ave transit mall, super traffic-calmed W Broadway section, and North Loop part are all pretty incredible. It's definitely not going to be super fast, but I think the direct access to businesses and homes right off the street will make up for it. The Lowry station looks much better (at least to me) with this rendering, and I think the trail connection looks tight. It could be my desensitized suburbanite brain talking, but the Bottineau Boulevard actually seems OK? Obviously not the greatest, but running the train right through these older suburbs rather than running along a freight right of way or highway puts it ahead of the game for American light rail--only having 2 park and rides is a bold decision. I was also pleasantly surprised about the part by the North Hennepin technical college, which seems to be an improvement in the walkability realm? And of course if the terminus gets developed that has huge potential.

My only caveat is that this thing will live and die on good signal priority. Given the distance between stations (especially on Bottineau), this thing has the potential to fly past cars, but if the signal priority sucks like it does on the Central Corridor this will be the Toronto Finch LRT all over again.

[Silophant]

I'm fairly optimistic about the signal priority working well - Minneapolis has been good about it for their (non-downtown) portion of the Green Line, and once it leaves Minneapolis, Bottineau is so much busier and higher-speed than its cross streets that I'd expect signal priority to be relatively easy - the greens are just so much longer for Bottineau than for the cross streets.

Other thoughts:
- Weird that they're only showing two-car trains in this animation, I'd expect them to at least be optimistic about haing the safety and/or maintenance staffing issues worked out by 2031 or whenever we're expecting this to open.

- Why is the Oak Grove Park and Ride ramp set back on the other side of a big patch of grass from the station? Is that meant to be a developable parcel in between, or is it just going to be an unpleasant walk if the weather's bad?

- I appreciate not wanting to waste valuable station-adjacent land on the OMF, but man is that a lot of extra non-revenue track between it and Oak Grove Station.

[BikesOnFilm]

- I appreciate not wanting to waste valuable station-adjacent land on the OMF, but man is that a lot of extra non-revenue track between it and Oak Grove Station.

Maybe this is optimistic on several fronts, but that leaves the door open to a future extension up 169 to Anoka without having to rebuild the OMF.

[Tcmetro]

- Why is the Oak Grove Park and Ride ramp set back on the other side of a big patch of grass from the station? Is that meant to be a developable parcel in between, or is it just going to be an unpleasant walk if the weather's bad?

The narrative in the video eluded to the space between the station and the garage being reserved for development.

[Korh]

Am I the only one who thinks the blue line extension and green line extension should of been reversed since,
The original blue line is mainly in its own ROW but the extension seems like to be mostly shared/in the middle of the street
While the original green line is mostly shared/in the middle of the street but the extension is mainly in its own ROW

[Hamstirly]

Setting aside the ROW differences, having the GLX and BLX be southwest and bottineau respectively makes sense from a system perspective.

Not that I think end to end rides are going to be all that common, but having SW go all the way into downtown Minneapolis and then turn out at a sharp angle toward the airport seems a little silly when it would be far faster to take a bus directly from SW Station to the airport. Those kind of direct connections aren't as convenient for St. Paul. I think North Minneapolis / NW burbs get more use out of the airport/moa transit connection anyway.

[angrysuburbanite]

Adding on, I’d imagine the one seat ride to the U of MN from anywhere on SWLRT will be a big ridership driver, whereas that wouldn’t be as true for BLRT. But yeah, both lines will have a “fast side” and “slow side” for the better or worse.

I’m personally looking forward to the through-running in downtown, so the westbound platforms finally get use! The Spanish Solution platform at Nicollet might actually be useful… Having an even amount of people entering/exiting the downtown stations in both directions will hopefully make them feel busier overall, especially at Hennepin and Target Field. Just imagine what events will look like!

[angrysuburbanite]

https://www.revisor.mn.gov/bills/94/202 ... body=House
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=arKZoj-tge4

A new bill introduced by Jon Koznick, Marj Fogelman, Marion Rarick, and Kristin Robbins (all Republicans) attempts to divert state funding for the blue line extension in favor of of an arterial bus rapid transit line along the same route. In a press conference, the legislators decried the cost and compared the line's construction to that of I-94 through the Rondo neighborhood of St. Paul. The legislatively mandated study to replace the LRT project with BRT is expected to be released this year despite previous analysis already finding LRT to be the (far) superior option for the corridor.

What are we doing here? In what world is it practical to stop a project which has a federally-approved environmental study and is at 60% design? I know this is just a performative stunt to look cost-conscious by these legislators, but LRT is just so far superior to bus rapid transit. These people who actually think that aBRT is a genuine alternative to a light rail project clearly do not ride transit and thus shouldn't be given the power to make decisions about it. And comparing it to Rondo is insane... this is almost the exact opposite! Like any of these Republicans would support anything other than freeway expansion on I-94.

And once again: the comparison to SWLRT is asinine at this point. Bottineau actively avoids grade separation as much as possible, as we've previously established, in favor of connecting communities directly within an existing corridor. And the budget is heavily inflated by the 40% contingency budget. The base cost of 2.2 billion is a lot but pretty reasonable for an LRT project of this length in the United States. These legislators seem completely unaware of the realities of building rail transit in the US, and seem to have forgotten the massive successes of both of the currently operating corridors. This is a cheaper and lower risk project than SWLRT, and will probably see higher ridership as well.

This thing is still getting built but my god is it tiring to put up with this opposition!

[nils]

https://www.revisor.mn.gov/bills/94/202 ... body=House
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=arKZoj-tge4

A new bill introduced by Jon Koznick, Marj Fogelman, Marion Rarick, and Kristin Robbins (all Republicans) attempts to divert state funding for the blue line extension in favor of of an arterial bus rapid transit line along the same route. In a press conference, the legislators decried the cost and compared the line's construction to that of I-94 through the Rondo neighborhood of St. Paul. The legislatively mandated study to replace the LRT project with BRT is expected to be released this year despite previous analysis already finding LRT to be the (far) superior option for the corridor.

What are we doing here? In what world is it practical to stop a project which has a federally-approved environmental study and is at 60% design? I know this is just a performative stunt to look cost-conscious by these legislators, but LRT is just so far superior to bus rapid transit. These people who actually think that aBRT is a genuine alternative to a light rail project clearly do not ride transit and thus shouldn't be given the power to make decisions about it. And comparing it to Rondo is insane... this is almost the exact opposite! Like any of these Republicans would support anything other than freeway expansion on I-94.

And once again: the comparison to SWLRT is asinine at this point. Bottineau actively avoids grade separation as much as possible, as we've previously established, in favor of connecting communities directly within an existing corridor. And the budget is heavily inflated by the 40% contingency budget. The base cost of 2.2 billion is a lot but pretty reasonable for an LRT project of this length in the United States. These legislators seem completely unaware of the realities of building rail transit in the US, and seem to have forgotten the massive successes of both of the currently operating corridors. This is a cheaper and lower risk project than SWLRT, and will probably see higher ridership as well.

This thing is still getting built but my god is it tiring to put up with this opposition!

Can you cite the analysis that shows the current proposed LRT alignment compared to BRT alternatives in the corridor?

[Wezle]

https://metrocouncil.org/News-Events/Tr ... Commo.aspx

It's a few years old and some of the ridership data has certainly changed, but I would bet that LRT still makes the most sense for the corridor. LRT is an investment for the future in a way that BRT is not.