But the law is vague if a disagreement persists. If a city or county votes a plan down, state law says it must suggest "specific amendments" for review by the Met Council. In 2016, Crystal did not vote on a different alignment for the Blue Line extension, avoiding a challenge to the state law. "I'm not confident our concerns will be addressed." "None of the designs or concepts they've brought to us have fallen into the realm of what we asked for," he said Friday. "I'm not in support of this line, and I'm not ready to move forward," said Crystal Mayor Jim Adams during the Blue Line Extension's Corridor Management Committee meeting Thursday.Īdams is mostly concerned that light rail will result in fewer traffic lanes on busy Hwy. "We are optimistic by the time votes on municipal consent occur, most of the city concerns will be addressed satisfactorily," said Trevor Roy, a spokesman for the Blue Line project. Municipal-consent votes by cities along the Blue Line extension's proposed alignment - Minneapolis, Robbinsdale, Crystal and Brooklyn Park, as well as the county and the council - are at least a year away. Plus, the Met Council is struggling to contain Southwest's scheduling delays and ballooning costs which have prompted an investigation by the legislative auditor. The controversy comes as Metro Transit tries to regain its footing after the COVID-19 pandemic decimated ridership, and as some passengers avoid light rail because they think it's unsafe aboard trains and at stations. It wasn't a roadblock for the existing Blue and Green lines, or for the Southwest light-rail project now under construction. It has been waiting for the Socotec report before choosing its next options.The debate raises questions whether a state law requiring cities and counties to grant "municipal consent" for light-rail routes will be tested for the first time. The association has hired its own lawyers and the engineering firm that originally designed the condo towers. What happens next is up to the condo association, with a meeting of condo owners scheduled for next week.
So it’s no surprise that construction has been plagued by delays and cost overruns that have pushed the final budget to $2.75 billion and the opening date to 2027. Ask any railroader about building tunnels, and their answer will be the same: they are complex and cost a lot more than you think. As a result the Kenilworth tunnel was proposed as an alternative to cut down on possible noise and hide the trains. The decision to keep the railroad and LRT on the same route through the mostly affluent area of Minneapolis remains controversial and prompted litigation seeking to stop the project, an effort that ultimately failed.
This enraged Minneapolis officials and residents, who had been promised by LRT planners that co-location would never happen. Eventually it was determined that using that route was impractical for a variety of reasons, and the rail line and LRT would have to coexist through Kenilworth. When the light rail line was first proposed, one of the biggest challenges was a proposed reroute to get the railroad out of Kenilworth, so only the LRT line and a popular regional trail would remain.įor more than a decade TC&W received proposals for a new route, with most centering around rerouting to the former Minneapolis, Northfield & Southern Railway line through suburban St. TC&W uses the line to reach its Class I connections in the Twin Cities. The biggest issue headache for the light rail extension has been the line through the affluent Kenilworth neighborhood, next to a rail line used by Twin Cities & Western and owned by the Metropolitan Council. The condo owners have said that there were no cracks until construction of the tunnel began. The remaining 25% is due to wind, freight train vibrations, deferred maintenance within the condo building, and neighboring light-rail construction, the firm determined.
Chicago-based Socotec blamed 75% of the building movement on “seasonal temperature changes,” Fox 9 Television reported. Socotec Engineering, Inc., gave a report to members of the Cedar Isles Condominium Association board Tuesday. The Twin Cities Metropolitan Council, which is building the 14.5-mile Southwest Light Rail/Metro Green Line Extension from Minneapolis to Eden Prairie, halted construction on the Kenilworth Tunnel in late January because of cracks found at nearby condos. MINNEAPOLIS – Construction can resume on a light rail tunnel in Minneapolis after an engineering analysis determined that construction played only minor role in cracks that developed at a nearby condo building.
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