I went to the opening ceremonies at the Coon Rapids MN station Saturday. My sisters live there (I live about 45 miles away.) It turned out they had plenty of railpasses so I got to take a free ride from there to the Target Field station in downtown Minnepolis and back. The ride was very smooth. After going to Northtown Yards as far back as 1984 to take pics it was kinda fun to take a train thru the yard.
I think it should be success. I know some folks have said spending that much money on a system that will "only" serve about 3000+ people isn't cost effective, but if you consider that will probably mean about 2000 fewer cars clogging Hwy 10 every day, it should make a difference.
Northstar Commuter Line Hits the (Rail) Road.
"I won't use it so it's a bad investment" is a common argument against many community projects, including new transit options. Don't worry; once it's been up and running for a while other near by communities will be yelling "Hey, where's ours?".
Dave
Lackawanna Route of the Phoebe Snow
I am glad to see that Northstar is up and running; finally !! I hope that the Twin Cities area will realize that commuter rail is the future and will expand it instead of more light rail. There are several routes that would benefit from commuter rail. It is obvious that the Metropolitan Transit Commission that will oversee it operation has a think small mentality. There are only 17 coaches and 5 locomotives. I wish it sucess and am looking forward to riding it.
I've seen some of the early test-runs over the last couple of weeks; wish I could have been in town on Saturday to get a railpass and ride the thing (darn it).
I'll be particularly interested to see what the ridership levels are like in the first few weeks. Presumably, there should be a marked increase during inclement weather periods when we get into the winter season - which hopefully is aways off yet.
If this thing works out well (and I hope it does) there are obviously some other opportunites to explore when expansion time comes again.
Keep in mind the Northstar line as of now is only using part of the eventual route. When the line is completed I would expect a lot more riders will come on. There are I believe 7 other commuter routes that are at various stages of planning. Because of the relatively flat geography of the area, and the interstate system being built just as the suburbs were expanding, the Twin Cities has a very large commuter base, covering 9 counties (which includes two in Wisconsin).
That being said, the Twin Cities really does need expanded light rail too. We're in the somewhat unusual situation that our three largest cities (Minneapolis, St.Paul, and Bloomington) are all in the same metropolitan area, with the centers or downtowns of each one being 10-15 miles away from the other two.
I wonder if one of the other seven possible routes includes the old M&StL via St Louis Park to Northfield? This would facilitate a Chicago-Twin Cities route by way of Northfield and Rochester and serve as a roughly north-south extension of the new service to Big Lake. A wye track would need to be restored at St Louis Park.
WestbuswayWhats the hold up with St. Cloud? They should have had that up and running in the first place there alreday is a station there
Whats the hold up with St. Cloud? They should have had that up and running in the first place there alreday is a station there
$130m
HarveyK400I wonder if one of the other seven possible routes includes the old M&StL via St Louis Park to Northfield? This would facilitate a Chicago-Twin Cities route by way of Northfield and Rochester and serve as a roughly north-south extension of the new service to Big Lake. A wye track would need to be restored at St Louis Park.
I noticed on aerial photos the "Louie" xM&StL appears to have been turned into a recreation trail, even though the Google map still shows a track. Oh well, that could cost more and leaves the Midway Station in limbo anyway.
The UP Spine Line heads into St Paul in the wrong direction; and it too misses the Midway station.
First of all Amtrak might consider phasing out Midway station sometime after the transit powers that be figure out just exactly what they will do; and just how generous the Minnesota Legislature with the coins. Some one put a 1 billion dollar price tag on the cost of a passenger train operation to Duluth Minnesota. We are a long way away from that considering how long it took to get Northstar up and running.Hopefully some body will figure out that we need commuter rail in this state.Remember that Minnesota's sixth congressional district elected Michelle Bachman, an enemy of transit who lives in her own fantasy world. Most of Northstar's route runs through her district.
The MN&S line around the Western suburbs of Minneapolis would be far down my list on viable commuter routes. Several lines would offer more positive results. The ex-GN Willmar line is best I think. The ex-M&StL main may be used by a future light rail line to Eden Prairie. The TCW line also offers a good route that would offer service to Chanhassen and Chaska. We have to keep the pressure on the politicans to fund it.
The debut of Northstar is covered on p. 22-23 of the February 2010 issue of Trains. The photo shows the inaugural train led by engine #504. This is the same engine driven by Mike Rowe when he visited the Motive Power factory in Boise, Idaho for the "Locomotive Builder" episode of "Dirty Jobs" (which was rerun on 1/2/10).
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