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Health & Fitness

What If You Had Bus Rapid Transit Without The Buses?

I guess we could take Cedar Avenue's potholes and road closures and street widenings and traffic alterations and just dedicate it all as a monument to the priorities of our current Legislature.

Where do I begin?

For the umpteenth time, Dakota County officials are going to scramble for money involved with the Bus Rapid Transit corridor on Cedar Avenue.

The South Metro has long been forging a plan for new options in transportation. Light rail has been blocked as too expensive an option. So our local legislators went along, reluctantly, with BRT (Bus Rapid Transit) proposals. It still costs a substantial amount of money and the funding has been patch worked together for over a decade. Congressman John Kline hasn't been much help in federal funding and legislative support has been sketchy. But gradually... very gradually... the project has come together thanks to the dogged determination of our county and city officials.

Finally the construction has started. Cedar Ave now looks like a war zone. Construction is moving up and down Apple Valley and Lakeville. Intersections are backed up and businesses are suffering through the delays and detours.

But, now, we have all the makings of this corridor except for one essential ingredient... buses.

"The plan was to order new buses right about now to operate the new station-to-station service that comprises BRT. But the Met Council, fresh off the budget deal's $51.8 million cut in transit funding, says it now can't afford to pay for expanded bus service -- including on the Cedar line -- so it won't order them."


Transportation cuts from the Legislature forced the Met Council to juggle its programs, its plans, everything. And now, BRT looks like a casualty of a Legislature run amuck.

You know, we do have representation in the South Metro. We do. We have Senator Chris Gerlach representing Apple Valley, Burnsville and Rosemount. We have Rep. Tara Mack representing Apple Valley and Burnsville. We have Rep. Kurt Bills representing Rosemount and Apple Valley.

They voted for a transportation bill, crafted by the Legislature, that led to this squeeze.  And gave lip service to some potential bonding proposals.  But now all of them seem to be MIA on this major transportation project.

I guess we could take all the project's potholes and road closures and street widenings and traffic alterations... and just dedicate it all as a monument to the priorities of our current Legislature.

They kept preaching about priorities. They told us that we have to work on what's important first.

Well, what we got for priorities is the Marriage Discrimination Amendment on the ballot and a budget full of holes and debt.

What we don't have is a damn bus for a bus transportation system.

Must be more of that "redesign" stuff.

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