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Met Council's Susan Haigh makes pitch for transit funding

By Steven Dornfeld | 01/19/12
Metropolitan Council chair Susan Haigh making her pitch for transit funding during her State of the Region address at Target Field.
Photo by Jeff Syme
Metropolitan Council Chair Susan Haigh

Metropolitan Council Chair Susan Haigh said Wednesday that the council will pursue state funding solutions that will enable further expansion of the regional transit system and resolve problems that leave "our major transitway projects in limbo, costing us time and money."

In her first State of the Region address, Haigh urged legislative approval of $25 million in state bonding to help fund the proposed 15-mile Southwest Corridor light-rail transit (LRT) line between downtown Minneapolis and Eden Prairie.

'New transportation option'
 Among some 100 transit projects around the nation, Haigh noted, Southwest is one of just a dozen that has received approval from the Federal Transit Administration to begin preliminary engineering. "Southwest light rail will provide a new transportation option for the existing 210,000 employees who work in the corridor, and it is already attracting new jobs and private investment," she said.

However, Haigh added that the state needs to fix the current "ad hoc system" of transit funding, which relies heavily on limited resources of local governments and the vagaries of the legislative process. 

Last week, DFL Gov. Mark Dayton created a transportation finance advisory committee — on which Haigh will serve — "to help us find new, innovative ways to finance improving our transportation systems." Dayton directed the group to provide written recommendations by Dec. 31

"Our vision is to work together to continue to build a 21st century regional transit system with expanding regional services that connect people to and from work, school and home, and to work together to strategically support economic development along transitways that will produce robust local economies and grow jobs," Haigh said.

Both the bonding request and any longer-term funding proposals could face tough going in the current, Republican-controlled Legislature, which has not been sympathetic to the needs of transit.

Shifts in emphasis
In her speech, delivered to a crowd of about 250 people in the Legends Club at Target Field, Haigh also signaled some shifts in emphasis by the Dayton-appointed Met Council from the course pursued during Republican Gov. Tim Pawlenty's administration. Haigh said the council will:

  • Channel more public resources to leverage higher density, transit-supportive development along the region's LRT, bus rapid transit and commuter rail lines. She said the council has now set aside $32 million for this purpose, using grants to local communities that have been relinquished during the current economic downturn.
  • Develop a regional housing policy plan for the first time in decades "to give communities the tools and support they need to build strong, healthy neighborhoods and to meet the needs of changing demographics." Under Pawlenty, the council generally shied away from issues unless they were specifically assigned by state law.
  • Help communities plan for slower regional growth and rapid demographic changes. "As interesting as how many people will live in our region is who will live in our region," she said. "We will have smaller households in some neighborhoods, more seniors in all communities, and by 2040, 45 percent of the people who live in this region will likely be people of color."

Haigh said she chose Target Field as the venue to make her first regional pitch "because it reminds us that, just like building Target Field, the work we're talking about today is not easy and it often requires bold leadership that cuts against the grain."

Target Field also sits adjacent to a transit station that serves the Hiawatha LRT line, the Northstar commuter rail line and the Central Corridor LRT line, which is scheduled for completion in 2014. If it wins federal and state funding, the Southwest  Corridor LRT line will be essentially an extension of Central. The council's current timetable calls for the completion of Southwest by 2018.

Comments (6)

Submitted by dan buechler on January 19, 2012 - 11:34am.

So SW gets the money again instead of SE or NE

Submitted by Ray Schoch on January 19, 2012 - 12:43pm.

I’ll never be able to afford to live in the area the proposed SW line would serve, but I still think it’s a good idea. The more people we can get out of cars for the daily commute, the better off we’ll be, and if there really are more than 200,000 people moving back and forth along that corridor every day, LRT is an excellent way to serve them, and far better than continuing to sink money into the fiscal black hole of highway construction and, especially, maintenance.

Would that we had (or could be persuaded to spend) the dollars necessary to have that sort of expansion simultaneously into the quarters Dan mentions in #1. That’d be my preference, but if we can only do one area at a time, then let’s do one at a time.

Submitted by dan buechler on January 19, 2012 - 4:36pm.

Let us see they have Hwy 62, 494, 169, 394 &35 W both with HOV lanes plus other county highways. What about the east side of St Paul should that just be for the elderly?

Submitted by David Greene on January 19, 2012 - 4:38pm.

@dan

The only "SE" and "NE" corridors are commuter rail lines, just sketches on a map at this time. The ridership doesn't exist to support those lines right now. The ridership in the SW corridor does. SW is ready to go today. So naturally it's going to get the money.

You can primarily blame the east metro counties for not getting their act together to build transit ridership. For a long time Dakota county opposed almost every transit investment. They've just started turning around the last few years. Washington county is still fairly hostile. Ramsey county certainly has the desire but it can't do it alone given the geographical realities of where the lines will run.

I think the east/west metro transit disparity is harmful to our region. But the Met Council can't dictate where the feds put their money if the ridership isn't there. Local officials have to fund transit and then get out and promote it.

Submitted by dan buechler on January 20, 2012 - 6:41am.

David thank you for your reply. I guess I was somewhat aware of local county resistance but you now confirmed it. It would make for a great historical article. One other question for the future then, the line from Big Lake to Mpls doesn't serve redevelopment well in NW suburbs as it is located on the river and far from some retail. Would better bridges help? Actually I find Central Avenue to be rather charming altho I am sure there are those who disagree.

Submitted by David Greene on January 20, 2012 - 11:41am.

@dan

The Northstar line, being commuter rail, really isn't meant to spur redevelopment. It is used too infrequently (rush hour, mainly). Some development will occur near stations but not nearly to the level that LRT promotes. They're very different systems.

The Bottineau LRT from Minneapolis to (likely) Maple Grove will be a redevelopment catalyst for the NW suburbs. In addition, the proposed Minneapolis streetcar on Central will help a bit there though it will only run to Columbia Heights. Of course there's no money at all for streetcars at the local level. There's federal money available but we can't leverage it due to lack of local investment.

Transit funding is complex. State and local dollars have to match federal funds. The most common way to raise local dollars for transit in other regions is to use a sales tax but in Minnesota local sales taxes need state blessing and good luck getting that with the current legislature. So we end up using property taxes for a lot of it, which is not a very equitable or efficient way to do transit funding. Thus the lack of funding at the local level.

It's all very frustrating. We're dead in the water while places like Denver, Dallas, Salt Lake City and Atlanta are building 3-4 LRT lines at a time.