Light rail, light rail, light rail. After the weather, the proposed Central Corridor light rail line has become the next most popular topic of conversation in Minnesota. If only this were a good thing. The majority of light rail-related talk is overwhelmingly negative; businesses are going to lose money because of construction, the U and Minnesota Public Radio have expensive and sensitive equipment that will be disrupted by the vibrations from the new line, and residents of the Twin Cities, (U students especially) are going to be bombarded by traffic issues in the three years of construction required to complete the project.

But even before this new nuisance, U students were getting screwed over by Metro Transit: rising U Pass costs, buses that are constantly late or don’t even show up, not to mention the ever-present crazies.

Like most University students, I ride the bus everywhere. The area where I live, like many other areas with high populations of students, has very little parking available. Metro Transit is the only way for many of us to get anywhere, especially during the winter. A large number of Metro Transit bus routes involve the U somehow, or at least intersect with a route that goes to the U. Why then, do U students seem to be lowest on the Metro Transit totem pole?

Currently, during rush hour traffic Minneapolis Metro Transit riders pay the same price as New Yorkers pay to take the subway. While at first $2.25 doesn’t seem unreasonable, the service we receive is in no way as convenient as the New York system. I personally have been abandoned by express buses to the U, as have many other students. A friend of mine was abandoned by her once-per-hour express bus during finals week. Again, this would not be a problem if these buses ran more than once an hour at their peak service time.

Luckily, the U Pass is still available to University students in order to lower the cost of commuting, but even this has become less and less of a value. For $97 per semester students can ride any bus or light rail route as often as they please. For a student who commutes four days a week, this is a 75 percent savings each semester. However, the price of the U pass continues to rise, making it more and more obsolete. When the U pass program began, it was accompanied with federal funding to encourage students to ride the buses and to lower traffic from commuting students. In 2000, when the U pass was created, it cost $50. The price of the U Pass didn’t rise again until 2006, when it crept up to $62. In the past 3 years, the price has gone up over $30. While it is true that the price of fuel and bus fare have gone up, so has the number of students participating in the U pass program. It seems that the raising of prices in no way corresponds to ridership, otherwise it would certainly not be increasing so quickly.

Currently, the light rail is most contested issue for Metro Transit, as well as for the University. The newly approved Central Corridor route will connect downtown Minneapolis to downtown St. Paul by way of University Avenue. Construction is slated to begin this summer and is expected to take three years. The total estimated cost of the project is $957 million, with fifty percent of that money coming from the Federal Government. The Hiawatha Line cost $715 million dollars, and since opening has made over $15 million dollars in revenue each year. While the light rail may initially have high costs, over a relatively small amount of time it will pay for itself.

No one is going to argue that more light rail routes are a bad idea. In theory, the light rail is convenient, quick and brings a huge amount of revenue to Metro Transit, which in turn helps to improve other Metro Transit facilities. The addition of another light rail line will also encourage the use of the new commuter train from the suburbs. In reality, the construction and subsequent trial and error process of traffic routing will disrupt traffic considerably and pedestrians and bikers at the U will have one more hazard to watch out for.

In all of this, Metro Transit is not interested in making this light rail convenient and effective for everyone. Both the U and MPR have filed lawsuits over the effect of vibrations from the trains on sensitive research and recording equipment respectively. From the responses on their website, Metro Transit finds these claims ridiculous and unnecessary, but these problems are far from petty. Specifically for the U, if this expensive research equipment on Washington Avenue needs to be moved, it will cost money. This money is going to have to come from somewhere, and with the already cut down budget from the state, the only place to take from will be students.

Students will also be affected by the lengthy construction period that will most likely shut down the Washington Avenue bridge for at least a few months. Instead of using the space already provided on the 35W bridge, and routing the trains through the already hollowed out, empty space in Dinkytown, Metro Transit plans to spend an extra $30 million to put the light rail through the already clogged main artery of Washington Avenue.

In the end, Metro Transit is just trying to squeeze as much money from the Feds as they can. They aren’t interested in regular ridership, only in ferrying people from park and ride lots to the stadium of their choice. So why don’t we just have the Twins pay for it?

Tags: Dinkytown