After spending a good portion of the year holding 16 public forums around the state on the issue of passenger rail service in Michigan, the Michigan By Rail group wrapped up its last meeting Thursday night in Ann Arbor.  With over 100 people participating, including numerous state and local elected officials, organizers presented attendees with an opportunity to create their own vision for what passenger rail service in Michigan should look like.  Interest in rail service was wide-ranging, with discussion taking place on existing Amtrak service, plans for expansion, questions on the status of Ann Arbor to Detroit and the WALLY line commuter service, and the state’s federal award of $161 million for high speed rail improvements along the Detroit to Chicago route.  Mayors John Hieftje of Ann Arbor and Paul Schrieber of Ypsilanti brought up the critical message of economic development and job creation that needs to be delivered to the Legislature as they consider future investments in passenger rail and attempt to procure the necessary matching funds to draw down the federal high speed rail grant. 

It was a great event and built upon the momentum from the previous forums, that there is broad support for passenger rail service among Michigan’s residents.  The new year should bring many opportunities to take the feedback from these forums to the Governor, MDOT and the Legislature and work with state leaders to establish a plan for implementing this vision.

Chris Hackbarth handles transportation issues for the Michigan Municipal League.  Chris can be reached at 517-908-0303 and by email at chackbarth@mml.org.

Communities in the Lansing area, along the Michigan Avenue/Grand River Avenue corridor, are planning a series of public meetings next week to gather input on expanded transit options for the corridor.  Open Houses are planned for Tuesday, November 9th in Lansing and at Michigan State University…Wednesday, November 10th in East Lansing…and Thursday, November 11th in Okemos.  Please visit http://www.migrtrans.org/getinvolved.html for more details on each of these meetings.  A vigrous discussion of the study that has been taking place over the past year is anticipated.  The organizers will be soliciting feedback from the attendees on the options that they would like to see the Steering Committee pursue.  I planning on attending the Thursday event and look forward to hearing more about how this corridor can be developed.

Chris Hackbarth handles transportation issues for the Michigan Municipal League.  Chris can be reached at 517-908-0303, or by email at chackbarth@mml.org.

U.S. Transportation Deputy Secretary John Porcari visited the Jackson Amtrak Station this afternoon and delivered a big, fat check to Michigan.  As part of the second round of high-speed rail investments from the federal government, Michigan’s application was successful to the tune of over $160 million.  Mayor Karen Dunigan of Jackson hosted a full house of dignitaries, members of the public and the media as Mr. Porcari delivered the news.  Michigan is now set to receive funding to acquire the rail line from Kalamazoo to Dearborn, for rail congestion relief efforts in western Detroit, and additional money for planning along the whole Chicago-Detroit corridor.  This is great news, especially considering how Michigan fared in the first round of grants early this year.  Mayor Dunigan and Secretary Porcari were joined by MDOT Deputy Director Jackie Shinn, Senator Carl Levin and Congressman Mark Schauer, who was acknowledged for his active role in advocating with US DOT for Michigan to receive this funding.  Each of the speakers talked about the importance of this investment as part of the nationwide transportation network and the impact on economic development and direct jobs that these grants will bring to Michigan.  When viewed alongside the awards granted earlier this year, the Chicago to Detroit route will benefit from over $400 million of federal investment from these two rounds of grants.  All that was missing was the bow in top.

Chris Hackbarth handles transportation issues for the Michigan Municipal League.  Chris can be reached at 517-908-0303, or by email at chackbarth@mml.org.

Where is rail transportation headed in Michigan? What role does rail freight play in our state’s economy? When and how will high speed rail become a viable option for passenger travel in our Great Lakes State?

MDOT is asking for the public to weigh in on these questions and any other issues that warrant consideration as part of the development of the Michigan State Rail Plan.  Required as a part of the federal government’s passage of the Passenger Rail Investment and Improvement Act of 2008, this rail plan will hopefully create a vision for how the State manages and invests in  rail infrastructure, a vision which is desperately needed and has been sorely lacking in recent years.

To ensure that there is broad public input, the series of public forums being conducted by the Municipal League’s partners within the Michigan By Rail group, are designed to engage the forum attendees in a similar vision-setting process and comments collected from the attendees will be submitted to the department as part of MDOT’s rail plan process.

Please take a few minutes to review the State Rail Plan website and submit your comments online, or plan on attending one of the upcoming Michigan By Rail forums (September 8th in St. Joseph and September 15th in Dearborn) and share your thoughts on what Michigan should be doing to leverage passenger, freight, commuter and light rail opportunities to boost economic development and quality of life.

http://www.michigan.gov/documents/mdot/MDOT-MiRailPlanOverview_330876_7.pdf

Chris Hackbarth handles transportation issues for the Michigan Municipal League.  Chris can be reached at 517-908-0303, or by email at chackbarth@mml.org.

Amtrak announced this afternoon that it would offer five separate east-bound and west-bound trains between Chicago and Kalamazoo over the Labor Day holiday.  From September 2 through September 7, Amtrak will offer five different daily schedule options for Kalamazoo, Niles and New Buffalo, and three trains per day stopping in Dowagiac.  Amtrak is  experiencing record ridership levels on its three Michigan lines and has been selling out its trains between Chicago and Detroit on weekends this year.  Hopefully, the signs of increasing ridership and the success of an experiment like this will lead Amtrak to increase passenger train frequency year round in Michigan.

Check out Amtrak’s Latest News Releases page for more details on this announcement.  http://www.amtrak.com/servlet/ContentServer?c=Page&pagename=am%2FLayout&cid=1241267278292

Chris Hackbarth handles transportation policy for the Michigan Municipal League.  Chris can be reached at 517-908-0303, or by email at chackbarth@mml.org.

Following on the heels of an extremely successful rail forum in Traverse City at the end of July, the Michigan By Rail  group is gearing up for the next round of forums that will take place along the I-94 corridor over the next month, from New Buffalo to Dearborn.  These forums are being held to solicit input from the public to assist the Michigan Department of Transpotration as they prepare Michigan’s statewide rail plan later this fall.

Mayor William Geisler will welcome attendees to the City of New Buffalo on Wednesday, August 18, from 6 to 8 PM at the Marina Grand Resort to continue discussions on the future vision for passenger rail in Michigan.  The following week, the City of Jackson will play host to a forum on Thursday, August 26th at the Michigan Theater in downtown Jackson.  During September the Michigan By Rail group heads back to Southwest Michigan for a forum in the St.Joseph/Benton Harbor area before moving out to Dearborn on the 15th of September.  Future forums are scheduled through early December all across Michigan.  Please check out the Michigan By Rail website for more details on these upcoming events, http://www.michiganbyrail.org/.  You can also read more about some of the past forums on Inside 208.

Chris Hackbarth handles transportation issues for the Michigan Municipal League.  Chris can be reached at 517-908-0303, or by email at chackbarth@mml.org.

A group of about 50 people attended a meeting in East Lansing last night to discuss their vision for the future of passenger rail in Michigan.  This meeting was the second in a series of forums being sponsored by the MI Association of Railroad Passengers and the Michigan Environmental Council.  Information on future forums scheduled around the state for the remainder of the summer and through the fall can be found at http://www.michiganbyrail.org/.  Next week, a forum is scheduled in Battle Creek (7/15), with a stop in Traverse City scheduled for the following week (7/22).

The purpose of these forums is to build momentum and provide some advance feedback for a series of public hearings expected later this year being organized by the MI Department of Transportation.  The department will be holding these later hearings as part of the process to develop a statewide rail plan as required by the federal Passenger Rail Investment and Improvement Act of 2008.

The East Lansing forum was co-hosted by State Representative Mark Meadows (D-East Lansing) and East Lansing City Councilmember Nathan Triplett.  Forum attendees participated in discussions about the status of rail infrastructure in Michigan, discussed local, state and federal rail projects and initiatives and even had a chance to create their own vision for where rail travel should exist in Michigan.  Nearly universally, attendees felt that rail access from Grand Rapids to Detroit was critical, along with some sort of North-South axis, possibly even extending to the Upper Peninsula and connecting population and tourism centers.  Connections based upon economic development were also at the forefront, with input concerning rail access to Metro Airport in Detroit and connections with Chicago, Canada and Toledo all being mentioned.

It was a great event and should help continue to drive the discussion about the importance of a statewide vision and committment to investment in rail travel in Michigan.  If you have a chance to attend one of the upcoming forums, I would encourage you to do so and show your support for passenger rail in Michigan.

Chris Hackbarth is the transportation policy advisor for the Michigan Municipal League.  Chris can be reached at 517-908-0303, or by email at chackbarth@mml.org.

The Capital is hopping this spring with transportation and transit issues being brought up on almost a weekly basis.  Just to bring everyone into the loop, last week, the House Transportation committee held a hearing in Ann Arbor to discuss the impact of MDOT’s proposed road project delays.  The committee then heard from a group of municipal officials about the importance of increased funding for the transportation system, as a whole, in renewing Michigan’s communities.  Mayor Paul Schreiber of Ypsilanti talked specifically about the importance of transit in his city and the choices that many communities are facing as they struggle with budget deficits and try to balance budgets, while still funding priorities that are essential for their residents.  The message delivered to the legislators on the committee was unanimous, that they need to act quickly to increase funding for transportation.

Next week, two major events are scheduled to take place on Tuesday, May 4th…

First, the Michigan Transportation Team, a coalition of local and state road and transit agencies and business groups, is planning a Transportation Funding Rally at the Capital, starting at 10:30 am in the Capitol Rotunda.  Everyone interested in supporting increased funding for transit should try and attend and let the legislature know how important it is that they act quickly to increase funding for transportation in Michigan.  For more details on the event, visit www.mml.org or www.DriveMI.org.

Second, the House Intergovernmental & Regional Affairs and the Senate Commerce committees are planning a joint hearing at 3 pm on May 4th to begin debate on 12 bills that make up the TRAIN package (Transit Revitalization and Investment Act).  These bills focus on expanding a number of existing economic development tools available to communities to include transit-oriented development projects as projects eligible to be considered by those mechanisms.  These bills include changes to things like downtown development authorities, tax increment financing, commercial redevelopment, brownfield, and corridor improvement acts.  The committees will begin consideration of House Bills 5171, 5211, 5212, 5979, 5988, and 5989 and Senate Bills 1233-1238 at 3 pm in room 519 of the House Office Building, in downtown Lansing.

Look for these topics, along with the Regional Transit Authority legislation looking to better coordinate SMART and DDOT transit services in Southeast Michigan, Complete Streets legislation aimed at including transit, bicyclists and pedestrians in the road construction planning process, new federal high-speed rail grant funding, and the state transportation budget, to all be hotly debated in the coming weeks. 

Chris Hackbarth is the transportation policy advisor for the Michigan Municipal League.  Chris can be reached at 517-908-0303, or by email at chackbarth@mml.org.

Attended an open house last night put on by the Michigan/Grand River Avenue Transportation Study group in Meridian Township.  CATA and the affected communities are working together to map out a vision for transit along this important corridor…stretching from the Capitol Building out to the Meridian Mall.  The study group has been look at the various transit systems operating around the country (buses, bus rapid transit, light rail, streetcars, etc) and researching each one to see which type of system and what kind of improvements would be most appropriate to make this corridor a true economic engine for the region.  The study group has been working to educate the public on the various options through the website www.migrtrans.org.  On this site, visitors can answer a survey about their preferences for improvements to the corridor and can actually map out how their preferred system would look, from choosing the kind of transit system, the number of road lanes, bike path and sidewalk locations.  Just a great tool!  Kudos to the study group for their efforts to bring about this vision and their work to reach out and educate the public!

Chris Hackbarth works for the Michigan Municipal League, specializing in transportation policy issues. You can contact him at 517-908-0303 or by e-mail.

Big things are happening in Washington, DC and Lansing right now regarding transit and funding.  US Transportation Secretary LaHood has begun to implement the Obama Adminstration’s vision for mass transit funding by proposing new guidelines for funding major transit projects based upon livability issues like economic development opportunities and environmental and community benefits that a project will provide.  In Lansing, legislators have introduced bills to create a new Regional Transit Authority, responding to Secretary LaHood’s challenge to SE Michigan to develop a more coherent regional system as a precursor to competing for federal mass transit funding.  This new legislation is expected to receive quite a bit of attention in the coming weeks, as swift committee action is anticipated.  To top it all off, a bi-partisan group of legislators, is expected to introduce a package of bills in early February that will greatly expand the ability of local communities to use a number of existing economic development tools to help finance Transit-Oriented Development projects.  Developing buildings and other facilities to help promote bus and rail transit systems.  Stay tuned for an exciting 2010!

Chris Hackbarth works for the Michigan Municipal League, specializing in Transportation issues. You can contact him at 517-908-0303 or by e-mail.