Stories indexed with the term ‘Amtrak’

Continued study of alternative sites and conceptual design for a possible new Amtrak station for the city of Ann Arbor has been given approval by the city council. The vote, taken at the council’s Oct. 21, 2013 meeting, was unanimous.

The specific action taken by the council was to approve a contract with URS Corporation Inc. (URS) to conduct the Ann Arbor Station project environmental review. The total approved for the Ann Arbor Station contract by the council – which will cover … [Full Story]

The Oct. 21, 2013 meeting of the Ann Arbor city council is the last one before the Nov. 5 election. After the election, the current group of councilmembers will have just one more meeting, on Nov. 7, before the new council is seated. The agenda the current council faces on Oct. 21 is relatively heavy.

It’s possible that the council might be briefed at the meeting on proposals received by the Oct. 18 deadline for the purchase of the city-owned parcel on William Street between Fourth and Fifth avenues (the former Y lot), but that’s not yet clear. The property had been listed for $4.2 million.

Many of the Oct. 21 items already on the agenda can be divided into three main categories: transportation, the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority, and the city’s energy commission.

The council held a work session about transportation on Oct. 14, 2013. Transportation-related items on the Oct. 21 agenda include a resolution that would admit Ypsilanti Township as a member of the Ann Arbor Area Transportation Authority. The specific question to be considered is a revision to the AAATA’s articles of incorporation – which would also expand the number of board members from nine to 10.

A second transportation-related agenda item is a city-led initiative to develop a new train station, with the location to be determined. The existing location, as well as one on Fuller Road near the University of Michigan medical campus, would be among the possibilities. On the council’s agenda is a contract with URS Corp. to conduct an environmental review that would include public engagement, site selection and conceptual design. The council’s authorization would be $824,875, an amount that includes a $63,083 contingency. The city would pay 20% of that, or about $165,000, with the rest covered by a federal grant that has already been awarded by the Federal Rail Authority.

To the extent that pedestrian infrastructure is also part of the city’s transportation system, a transportation-related pair of items would alter the definition of “sidewalk” to include cross-lot walkways. Affected by the change, for example, would be walkways that connect streets with parks or school property. The change would allow for use of sidewalk repair millage funds to repair cross-lot walkways, without triggering the winter maintenance requirement for adjacent property owners.

Finally, the city council will be asked to approve an annual resolution related to wintertime transportation – the purchase of ice control salt for city streets.

Related to the Ann Arbor DDA are three items: (1) reconsideration of the appointment of Al McWilliams to the board of that authority – likely to be confirmed on a re-vote, if reconsideration is approved; (2) final consideration of a change to the city ordinance regulating the DDA’s TIF (tax increment financing) capture – likely to be postponed yet again; and (3) a budget allocation of $280,000 to cover costs associated with replacement of downtown ornamental, pedestrian-scale light poles. The DDA is contributing $300,000 to the cost of the $580,000 project. Some councilmembers think the DDA should pay for the full amount, so the eight-vote majority required for the budget amendment might not be achieved.

The specific size of the majority vote required could also be a factor in one of two agenda items related to the city’s energy commission – the re-appointment of Wayne Appleyard to the commission. The confirmation will need a seven-vote majority under the city charter, because he’s not a city resident. The other energy-related item is an energy commission-recommended resolution – which was previously rejected, reconsidered and postponed by the city council. The resolution would call upon the city’s employee retirement board to divest from fossil fuel companies.

This article includes a more detailed preview of each of these agenda items. More details on other meeting agenda items are available on the city’s online Legistar system. Readers can also follow the live meeting proceedings Monday evening on Channel 16, streamed online by Community Television Network.

The Chronicle will be filing live updates from city council chambers during the meeting, published in this article below the preview material. The meeting is scheduled to start at 7 p.m. [Full Story]

An Ann Arbor city council work session held Oct. 14, 2013 provided a roundup of several transportation initiatives.

The projects all fit into the general rubric of regional transportation – relative to different scales of the concept of “region.” Eli Cooper, the city of Ann Arbor transportation program manager, led off the session with some introductory remarks that framed the session in those terms – regions defined on a national, state and more local scale.

Nationally, Amtrak provides rail service between major cities like Chicago and Detroit. And it’s to support that service that the city of Ann Arbor is currently planning for a new or reconstructed Amtrak station. A contract for a required planning study, 80% of which is funded with a federal grant, appears on the council’s Oct. 21 agenda. [Legistar file 13-1128]

On a smaller regional scale, SEMCOG (Southeast Michigan Council of Governments) is the lead organization for a possible new kind of future service on the same tracks as the Amtrak inter-city service: an Ann Arbor-Detroit commuter rail service. That would be at least two years out, partly because no operating funds for the service have yet been identified. Those funds could eventually come from the nascent southeast Michigan Regional Transit Authority (RTA), which could ask voters in a four-county region – Macomb, Oakland, Washtenaw and Wayne – to approve either a transit property tax or a vehicle registration fee dedicated to supporting transit.

On the smallest regional level, voters in member jurisdictions of the Ann Arbor Area Transportation Authority could be asked as soon as May 2014 to approve additional transportation funding. The AAATA currently includes the city of Ann Arbor, the city of Ypsilanti, and Ypsilanti Township – provided that the Ann Arbor city council approves the township’s membership at its Oct. 21 meeting. [Legistar file 13-1267]

As AAATA staff stressed at the Oct. 14 work session, the board of that organization has not yet made a decision to place a millage request in front of voters. If approved by voters, the additional funding – likely to be 0.7 mills – would be used to increase frequency and time of service in the local region.

Details about the service improvements are the subject of a series of public meetings, which is set to start this Thursday, Oct. 17 from 4-6 p.m. That first session takes place just before the AAATA board meeting at the Ann Arbor District Library’s downtown location. [Full Story]

On Feb. 10, 2012, the University of Michigan and the city of Ann Arbor announced that UM would not be partnering to build a 1,000-space parking structure as part of the proposed Fuller Road Station project. [Chronicle timeline of Fuller Road Station]

In that context, it’s still expected that the city of Ann Arbor will continue to pursue the possibility of a transportation facility at the Fuller Park location – a proposal that would include moving the existing Amtrak station from its current spot on Depot Street, just north of (and below) the Broadway bridges.

An appropriate site for the Amtrak station has been studied before – 30 years ago. At the request of Sabra Briere, a city councilmember who … [Full Story]

Editor’s note: The Ann Arbor city council is currently contemplating a major decision on adopting the legal framework by which its local transit authority could transition to a countywide system of governance – or at least one that is geographically bigger than the city of Ann Arbor. The decision on ratifying a four-party agreement – between the city of Ann Arbor, the city of Ypsilanti, the Ann Arbor Transportation Authority and Washtenaw County – was postponed for the second time at the council’s Monday, Jan. 23 meeting. The council meets next on Feb. 6. 

The Chronicle is taking the pause between council meetings as an opportunity to offer readers a look at Ann Arbor’s current bus system ridership numbers over the last several years.

Part of a 30-year transit vision developed by the AATA includes the relocation of the Amtrak station – from Depot Street to a spot in the city’s Fuller Park. The proposed city/University of Michigan collaboration on the Fuller Road Station includes a large parking structure for the UM medical complex as its first phase. So we’re also taking a look at current ridership data on the Amtrak line through Ann Arbor.

Ann Arbor’s regular fixed route bus system provided 5.95 million rides for fiscal year 2011, which ended Sept. 30, 2011. That’s slightly better than the previous year, but was slightly off the record high year of 6.02 million rides delivered in FY 2009. The first three months of the 2012 fiscal year – October, November and December 2011 – show slight increases over the monthly numbers for FY 2011.

Of those 5.95 million rides provided by AATA in FY 2011, 2.43 million of them (41%) were provided through the University of Michigan MRide program – which allows faculty, students and staff of the university to board AATA buses without paying a fare. The cost for the service is paid by UM to the AATA. It was a record-setting year for the MRide program.

Also making up a portion of those 5.95 million rides were trips taken by holders of the getDowntown go!pass program, which allows downtown Ann Arbor employers to provide free bus passes for their employees for a nominal cost – the cost of the rides is funded through a grant from the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority.

In FY 2011, 634,000 rides were provided under the go!pass program – a 23% increase over FY 2010, adding to the trend of monotonically increasing numbers of go!pass rides over the last decade. The first three months of FY 2012 don’t show the same kind of double-digit increases for go!pass use as FY 2011 – they’re tracking roughly the same as last year.

The number of riders getting on and off the Amtrak trains that passed through Ann Arbor during the 2011 calendar year was 141,522. That figure tracked close to the same level of activity the station has seen since 2006 – from 140,000 to 145,000 riders. Through May 2011, Amtrak was on pace to eclipse the record number of riders in 2010 (145,040). But starting in July 2011, ridership was lower in every month (compared to 2010) through the end of the year.

Charts and graphs by The Chronicle – as well as more detailed breakdowns – are provided after the break. [Full Story]