Comments on: Northstar Commuter Rail Opens for Service in Minneapolis

By: Matt

Matt — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 17:14:13 +0000

To those who have used Northstar: Are the suburban platforms built with future tracks in mind? I really hope there’s space for 3 or 4 tracks between the platform, or else it would make additional investment in this corridor prohibitively expensive. This is the BNSF’s north transcon, after all. In addition, south of Foley Jct shares traffic with trains heading to Duluth (world’s largest inland port) and this section has already been proposed to be at least triple tracked to Mpls Jct. Maybe if the government helped make Northstar triple/quad tracked they could get much much more favorable trackage rights from BNSF and in the end it would be a wise investment on both sides.

By: Nathanael

Nathanael — Sun, 29 Nov 2009 09:54:35 +0000

ROW purchase can be very expensive, and I’m not surprised at the track rights costs — this is the BNSF mainline, after all, with the only alternative routes being several states out of the way. I just hope they got a lot of room for future expansion with that purchase. If it was $100 million for rights to run just the current set of trains, it *is* too much. If it inlcudes rights to run a whole bunch more trains all the way to St. Cloud, maybe not.

By: Alon Levy

Alon Levy — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 19:00:39 +0000

Taking the lower end of per-km cost, $100 million would get you 7 km of light rail, or 4.5 km of high-speed rail. I’m not sure about commuter rail.

By: Andy K

Andy K — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 16:28:37 +0000

$100mil for track rights seems obscene. How much track could be built for that amount?

By: Cameron Slick

Cameron Slick — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 01:57:35 +0000

Now that we have a downtown station, some rolling stock, and a maintenance facility, the cost per mile of future commuter rail will be substantially cheaper…unless we get another Pawlentyesque governor,

By: Aaron in the Bronx

Aaron in the Bronx — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 00:16:30 +0000

A hearty welcome to the nation’s 22nd active regional rail system (and the fourth to open in three years). We need to make better use of our many urban rail rights-of-way, and so I wish Northstar the best of luck.

By: Ted King

Ted King — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 10:43:46 +0000

Total tab - $317M Track rights - $100M+ Passenger cars - $45M (18 * $2.5M) Rolling stock (locos.+ cars) - $66M (unconfirmed blog post) LRV extension + stn. + mini-yard - $100M (est. - no hard number found) The MPR re-cap. below was the source for some of the above numbers. More links : Northstar numbers page MPR re-cap. Rail industry re-cap. Backgrounder blog post P.S. The disturbing thing about the above information is the absence of a costs breakdown on the Northstar numbers page. I also poked around at the Metro.Council's website and didn't turn up anything.

By: Nathanael Nerode

Nathanael Nerode — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 03:11:32 +0000

“Brad, unless there’s a reason to extend the LRT to the station other than the commuter line, the cost of the extension should be considered to be part of the commuter line’s expense.”

There was. There’s a huge asterisking stadium right there. It also extends the LRT terminus closer to a bunch more businesses on the north side of the tracks. Actually, extending the LRT line even further north would be very reasonable,perhaps to the Metro Transit HQ, where it would meet the 5, 19, and 22 buses, two of which are high-frequency services. Further extension along the 5 or 19 routes would also make sense. The LRT extension was undeniably worthwhile.

FYI, the commuter rail project features double tracking along most if not all of its length, which should allow all-day service in the future and improve Amtrak service. Although it seems a bit overbuilt for the existing service!

By: Justin Bernard

Justin Bernard — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 14:45:55 +0000

13 years, and nearly $320 Million for a peak service commutter rail system. The process to build these projects needs to be fixed. This should not be accepted. I hope this system was designed for all day service in the future.

By: Ted King

Ted King — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 13:37:12 +0000

I don't see where the university is coming from. Are the main drags - University and Washington - "No Trucks" zones ? If trucks are permitted is there a weight limit ? If there are labs with delicate instruments along University or Washington then the administrators may have been negligent. That's a pretty good sized campus (see map below). I wonder about its growth pattern over the years and how much reserve space it has. Also, how strong is the Washington Ave. bridge ? I tried to pull up the reports from MinnDOT and the bridge wasn't in the PDFs. I also checked the Hennepin Co. web site to no avail. Map of the Twin Cities Campus, Univ. of Minn. Central Corridor Project page Washington Ave. Bridge Minn.DOT Reports