A committee studying a possible light rail transit corridor through the southwestern suburbs made clear what route it believes the trains should take through Minnetonka and Eden Prairie.
In January of 2005, the Hennepin County Regional Rail Authority began a study of possible mass transit options for the southwest metro area.
Over the past two years, the Southwest Policy Advisory Committee has been charged with reviewing the transit options and reducing the number still under consideration.
Earlier this year, the committee eliminated bus rapid transit from further consideration. Under that option, roads devoted exclusively to buses would have been built. In eliminating bus rapid transit, the committee determined it wasn't a cost-effective option based on ridership.
That left light rail transit (LRT) as the mass transit option still under consideration. If an LRT line is built, it would follow a southwesterly route from Minneapolis through St. Louis Park and Hopkins.
The Policy Advisory Committee (PAC) has been considering four options for the route once it hits Hopkins. The line could terminate at a station near Shady Oak Road or continue to the south along one of three routes.
At a meeting last week, the PAC clearly favored one of the four options. Their choice is the route that heads south from Shady Oak Road and travels past the Opus development in Minnetonka, the Golden Triangle business district in Eden Prairie and terminates at the Eden Prairie Center mall.
In HCRRA documents, that route is referred to as option 3.
Katie Walker, who works for Hennepin County's Department of Housing, Community Works and Transit and served as the study manager, told PAC members that under the best-case scenario, the Southwest Corridor LRT route could be operating in 2015.
She said that at present, the Metropolitan Council has a southwest corridor project slated in its plans for after 2020.
Walker explained that under the Met Council's current timetable, the Central Corridor LRT project - which would run between downtown Minneapolis and St. Paul - is penciled in between 2012 and 2014. Then there is a six-year gap before the Met Council would undertake another project.
One of the resolutions the PAC approved at its meeting on Dec. 13 was a request that the Met Council prioritize the Southwest Corridor project to start once the Central Corridor is finished.
Among PAC members present at the meeting, debate centered around whether to include in its recommendations a second route option through the southwestern suburbs.
That route follows the path of the Southwest LRT Regional Trail from Shady Oak Road, crossing under Interstate Highway 494 at Rowland Road in Minnetonka. Under that plan - called option 1A on the HCRRA's diagrams - the LRT line would terminate at a point along Highway 5.
Committee members from Eden Prairie expressed the strongest opposition to including option 1A in the PAC's recommendation.
"Why put in an option we can't stand behind?" asked Eden Prairie Mayor Nancy Tyra-Lukens.
Walker explained that while 1A may not be the preferred choice, it did meet the criteria as a cost-effective project.
Cost estimates put route 1A at $865 million, while the lower-priced of two alternatives of the Opus/Golden Triangle route is estimated at $1.2 billion.
The two alternatives for option 3 concern its route into Minneapolis. The route estimated at $1.2 billion - option 3A - would put the LRT line through the Kenilworth Corridor, which runs between Lake of the Isles and Cedar Lake.
From there, it would cross under Interstate Highway 394 roughly at Penn Avenue and would approach downtown from the north.
Under that route, the southwest LRT line would end at a train station near downtown. Such a station also would be the terminal for the Hiawatha and Central Corridor LRT lines as well as the Northstar Commuter Rail line.
Construction began this past August on the Northstar line, which will operate from the downtown station to Big Lake.
If the Central Corridor and Southwest Corridor LRT lines were built to the downtown Minneapolis station, it would be possible for people to travel by train from Eden Prairie to the state Capitol, or from Anoka to Eden Prairie.
Uptown/Nicollet route
The other potential route for the southwest line puts it in the Midtown Greenway through Southwest Minneapolis.
The trains would travel through a tunnel under Nicollet Avenue between the Midtown Greenway and Franklin Avenue. From Franklin into downtown, they would travel on the surface.
While that option would have tracks from the Southwest line crossing the Hiawatha Line in downtown Minneapolis, the two lines wouldn't be connected.
HCRRA estimates put the price tag for running option 3 through the Greenway and up Nicollet at $1.4 billion - $200 million more than option 3A.
While option 3C has the highest projected cost, it also has the highest estimate of riders. The HCRRA estimates that 28,100 people would ride the line each day in 2030, versus 27,000 for option 3A and 23,500 for option 1A.
Consensus among PAC members was to include both 3A and 3C in their recommendations. The PAC's choices are forwarded to the HCRRA, which is expected to hold a public hearing on the project in January.
Following the hearing, the HCRRA will vote on its recommendations for the project, which will be passed on to the Metropolitan Council.
The Met Council then will consider the project and ultimately will vote on what it believes is the best route.
From a planning standpoint, the next step is an environmental impact statement for the proposed Southwest Corridor project. Additionally, sometime in the next few months representatives from the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) will be briefed on the possible project.
Funding from the FTA is needed for the project to occur. In a project such as this, the FTA traditionally pays for about half the project. The state and county also are expected to contribute substantial money toward it.
In response to concerns about including option 1A, which wasn't the PAC's preferred route, Walker explained that FTA representatives don't tell local governments that they must build a project on a particular route.
Rather, the FTA evaluates all the proposed transit projects around the country that have asked for money, then decides how it will allocate its funding.
PAC member Dan Duffy, who represents the TwinWest Chamber of Commerce, made a motion to eliminate option 1A from the committee's recommendations. However, his motion failed with six votes in favor and nine opposed to it.
Resolutions recommending routes 1A, 3A and 3C and asking the Met Council to give the Southwest Corridor priority after the Central Corridor were approved.
