Green Line Extension - Southwest LRT

[mattaudio]

It is friendlier for the resale environment for nearby landholders. They think.

[EOst]

Imagine if the Park Board wanted to spend $125 million on our neighborhood parks, instead of a tunnel for a hundred people.

[mattaudio]

Anyone have a source to know how much park amenities cost? How much per boulevard tree, per park shelter, per etc?

Granted, $125 million in SWLRT's budget couldn't rebuild park amenities in Mpls. But the $500k they're wasting on the lawsuit/study could. And $125 million is a shockingly large amount of money to flush down the toilet, even if it couldn't be used for anything else.

[acs]

Also per the article the earliest it could open is late 2019, not early 2019. This is a project that has had it's opening delayed since 2014, and we wonder why it takes is 10 years to build each new transit line?

[Nathan]

Anyone have a source to know how much park amenities cost? How much per boulevard tree, per park shelter, per etc?

Granted, $125 million in SWLRT's budget couldn't rebuild park amenities in Mpls. But the $500k they're wasting on the lawsuit/study could. And $125 million is a shockingly large amount of money to flush down the toilet, even if it couldn't be used for anything else.

The entire River First project... 11 miles of riverfront park... was estimated at about $275m so A LOT.

[acs]

I can totally see why Dayton wants to punish the park board now. Remember, he delayed the line by a year so they could study these options, then he personally sits down with the Met Council, the Park Board, the Neighborhood and the cities to negotiate a deal which appeared to save the project. Then after all of this, the park board (no doubt at the urging of the neighborhood) turns around and back stabs the Met Council and the City, delaying this by another year. Going over your bosses head when you don't get your way is a surefire way to get fired in both politics and everywhere else.

[mattaudio]

p-a-n-t-a-s-a-s-s-y map: https://i.imgur.com/RBjHVYN.png

[Rich]

The entire River First project... 11 miles of riverfront park... was estimated at about $275m so A LOT.

Also, the price tag for "The Commons" has been put at $20 million, and the park board has said it'd cost $2 million a year to operate. So for $125m we could build The Commons and run it for 50 years.

[grant1simons2]

They even claimed themselves at last nights meeting that they used funds that could've been used elsewhere , to spend on this project.

[EOst]

They even claimed themselves at last nights meeting that they used funds that could've been used elsewhere , to spend on this project.

This is the sort of shit that really destroys people's perception of politicians.

Yesterday I had to help up an old lady who had slipped and fallen on the icy sidewalks around Stevens Square Park. She could have died! I've emailed and called and complained a dozen times over the winter about the fact that they (almost uniquely in the neighborhood!) have basically abandoned any pretense of shoveling the park, and never once even received a courtesy response. I wonder how many parks they decided to not maintain in order to do this.

[seanrichardryan]

In particular, the board is concerned about the noise and vibrations that would be caused by light rail trains crossing a bridge that now sees only recreational and freight rail traffic. A replacement bridge would be substantially wider to accommodate the new traffic, which a consultant hired by the board outlined in a presentation Wednesday would “reduce natural light in the channel” and have a “visual impact.”

To what end will these dangerous vibrations wreak on our delicate parklands??

SOunds like 145m well spent.

[acs]

They even claimed themselves at last nights meeting that they used funds that could've been used elsewhere , to spend on this project.

This is the sort of shit that really destroys people's perception of politicians.

Yesterday I had to help up an old lady who had slipped and fallen on the icy sidewalks around Stevens Square Park. She could have died! I've emailed and called and complained a dozen times over the winter about the fact that they (almost uniquely in the neighborhood!) have basically abandoned any pretense of shoveling the park, and never once even received a courtesy response. I wonder how many parks they decided to not maintain in order to do this.

Amen. This is our version of the big dig and people will rightfully point to this as a glaring example of government ineptitude and corruption. To put it another way, if the Kenilworth NIMBY's get their way then it's likely a privately funded 200 mph high speed rail link between Houston and Dallas will be up and running before our multibillion dollar Met Council albatross.

[Tcmetro]

Some fun new SWLRT things:

Feb. newsletter with potential station designs: http://metrocouncil.org/METC/files/b8/b ... 983bca.pdf

Not really any new info from the Feb. meeting presentation: http://metrocouncil.org/METC/files/f7/f ... 079d75.pdf

[David Greene]

Feb. newsletter with potential station designs: http://metrocouncil.org/METC/files/b8/b ... 983bca.pdf

The Landmark design looks like it's going to dump water right on patrons!

[David Greene]

Not really any new info from the Feb. meeting presentation: http://metrocouncil.org/METC/files/f7/f ... 079d75.pdf

Biggest news out of this meeting is they got rid of the NIMBY troublemakers from the CAC. This group seems much more eager to productively move forward.

[Anondson]

Troublemakers? I'm not muckraking, but I'm eager what to know who you mean.

[David Greene]

Troublemakers? I'm not muckraking, but I'm eager what to know who you mean.

I'm not going to name names but the minutes are all publicly available. Reading through you'll quickly determine who I'm talking about.

And by "troublemakers" I mean people who bogged down every damn meeting fighting about freight rail. For two years.

Interestingly, the re-formed CAC doesn't have Minneapolis neighborhood reps like before. They seem to be more like at-large seats but I'm sure the representatives live near the line. Not one of the Minneapolis reps gave their neighborhood during introductions which I found odd.

[talindsay]

Aha, the integrated public art on this line is meant to "reflect community values and histories". I guess this means the Eden Prairie and Minnetonka stations will be constructed of 2x6 and plasterboard hastily assembled with glue in three days, with fake siding glued on?

[Tcmetro]

Maybe they can use the art budget to paint the lines in the parking lot green instead of white. Because, you know, the environment.

[grant1simons2]

As much as you guys like to poke fun at the burbs, there's a lot of preserved history in Eden Prairie and a bit in Minnetonka. I would expect the station to have some sort of prairie aspect to it. Seems like everything in the city does not. But that's because those prairies used to cover everywhere in the city, and there are still some large parts that have been untouched where you can still see it.