DenverOkie.com

Is it time for Light Rail in Oklahoma City after a ride in Denver?

by Calvin Rees

We have been using light rail in Denver and trying to check out how it would work in Oklahoma City. I rode it to the Convention area in downtown Denver and back to the hotel which is located in southeast Denver.

It was an interesting experience even though I had experience when living in Europe. I talked to some locals and they said they are using it more because of the high price of gasoline but that it is not always convenient to where they want to go. Some of our Delegates liked it but some had to stand all the way to where they were going.

The price of the ticket was $3 for a round trip but a monthly pass is just $108 and $54 for seniors, Disable students aged 6 through 19.

Back in April Mayor Mick Cornett said, he wants to see a light rail system that serves downtown and tourists. But he added he would want to see Edmond and Norman participate in funding additional rail links to those suburbs.

According to the Transcript Norman seems interested in the idea their City Council will likely be looking at a resolution on the future of light rail. It involves a group called OnTrac’s initiative for saving the downtown Union Station rail line by slightly realigning the I-40 Crosstown Expressway project.

It also seems that the Norman City Council has some of the same ideas as Cornett, “Light rail and the Crosstown relocation affect all of central Oklahoma. It’s Norman’s fight just as it is Edmond’s and Shawnee’s.”

Last week at the Shawnee City Council meeting they had a presentation focused on commuter trains reaching out from Oklahoma City to various communities throughout Oklahoma.

According to the News-Star, “Shawnee has a serious concern as it relates to rail availability for area industries. The heavy rains during the summer of 2007 had a significant impact on several of our businesses, because it weakened and washed out portions of the railroad, hampering service to them.”

“Of immediate concern is to strengthen the tracks and make them more secure where trains can move faster between here and Oklahoma City.”

In Edmond they are hoping to get the Heartland Flyer to stop there in an Edmond Sun story back in June. ““We are interested in this,” O’Neil said at Monday’s City Council meeting. “This creates a lot of opportunities for our community — a lot of opportunities for downtown Edmond — a lot of opportunities when you consider $4 for a gallon of gasoline for transportation.”

Councilman Wayne Page said “rising gasoline prices is only one reason he supports the proposed Heartland Flyer’s Edmond connection.” In addition, Edmond needs to look toward light rail if it wants to maintain a vision of continued growth,” Page said.

It looks that the Suburbs and Oklahoma City are talking about Light Rail now it would seem to be the right time to start the process to get it going and finding the finances.

 

 

 

 

This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 26th, 2008 at 4:02 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.