Useful Links
Transit Corridors
This page last updated Thursday, July 3, 2008 12:37 PM
Projects that Ramsey County Regional Rail and its partner agencies are working on:
Central CorridorThe 11-mile Central Corridor light rail transit line will link Minnesota’s Union Depot multi-modal transit hub in downtown St. Paul to the Hiawatha light rail line in downtown Minneapolis. The Corridor connects major Twin Cities destinations — the two downtowns, the University of Minnesota, St. Paul’s Midway commercial district and the state Capitol and all of the vibrant residential and commercial neighborhoods along University Avenue. The project began preliminary engineering in summer 2007. Final design will begin in 2009 and take about a year. Construction is expected to begin in 2010, with service beginning in 2014. The Metropolitan Council is lead agency for design, construction and operation of the line. An estimated 44,000 passengers will ride the line each day by 2030. |
Red Rock CorridorConsultants are calculating transit ridership projections for the Red Rock Corridor, which runs from Hastings through St. Paul to Minneapolis. A study of passenger rail from Red Wing to Union Depot and on to downtown Minneapolis has been released by the Ramsey County Regional Rail Authority.
|
Interstate 94 Corridor
|
Robert StreetA feasibility study, begun by Dakota County in 2007, will assess transit improvements and possible routes from Minnesota’s Union Depot in St. Paul to Rosemount in Dakota County. The Robert Street Corridor study area extends from I-35E to the Mississippi River. |
High Speed RailThe Midwest Regional Rail System is a nine-state effort to create a passenger rail system spreading out on rehabilitated freight railroad tracks from Chicago to population centers throughout the upper Midwest, including a terminal at Minnesota’s Union Depot in St. Paul. Trains capable of traveling at up to 110 mph would carry passengers on existing freight railroad rights-of-way. The Midwest Regional Rail Initiative is a multi-agency effort involving Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, Ohio, and Wisconsin and 3,000 miles of high speed passenger rail service. The goal of the initiative is to develop a passenger rail system that offers business and leisure travelers shorter travel times, additional train frequencies, and connections between urban centers and smaller communities. Capital cost of the entire nine-state system is estimated at $7.7 billion. |
Rush Line
|
Northeast DiagonalThe Northeast Diagonal transitway corridor follows the partially abandoned and existing Burlington Northern Santa Fe railroad tracks from northeast Minneapolis through St. Anthony, Roseville, Shoreview, Little Canada, Vadnais Heights, Gem Lake, White Bear Township, and ending in White Bear Lake. A 2002 study funded by the Regional Rail Authorities of Ramsey and Hennepin counties recommended that the communities along the corridor adopt “smart growth” policies to promote business and residential development and build a market for transit along the line.
Click here for information on the Union Depot renovation project
|
For more information
|
State and county officials in Ramsey and Washington counties have expressed an interest in improved transit service in the Interstate 94 corridor from Minnesota’s Union Depot multi-modal transit hub in St. Paul to fast-growing St. Croix County, Wis. Other work may be undertaken on the Highway 36 or Highway 5 corridors from Union Depot to Wisconsin.
This Corridor from Union Depot to Hinckley is seeking state capital and operating funds to begin commuter bus service between Lent Township and St. Paul. A federal alternatives analysis, expected to conclude in 2009, is also studying transit routes and mode options – including commuter bus and rail – in the corridor. Meanwhile, commuter park-and-ride lots continue to be constructed in the corridor. Park-and-ride lots have opened at Maplewood Mall and near Stacy, at Highway 17 and I-35. Another will open soon in Forest Lake. The Metropolitan Council began commuter bus service between Forest Lake and downtown Minneapolis in January 2008 in response to the 2007 Interstate 35W bridge collapse.