Hotline #115 - December 3, 1999

The Utah Transit Authority will formally open its TRAX light rail line on December 4, with revenue service following on December 6. Rides all day December 4 will be free, and there will be a ceremony from 10:00 am to 12:00 noon at the Delta Center in downtown Salt Lake City. This is the first electric rail transit in Utah since the Bamberger Electric Railroad closed in 1952. The opening this weekend is three months ahead of schedule. The line extends 15 miles from the Delta Center south to the Sandy Civic Center. Regular service will run Monday-Saturday only.

Amtrak will extend the Chicago-Indianapolis Hoosier State overnight to Jeffersonville, Ind., beginning with the southbound trip of December 17. It will run as a separate train the four days that the Hoosier State currently does, and as a section of the Cardinal on the other three days. The new service, to be renamed the Kentucky Cardinal, will arrive at Jeffersonville at 8:40 am and depart at 10:25 pm, carrying Superliner coaches, one Superliner sleeper, and mail cars. Jeffersonville is just across the river from Louisville, Ky., through Amtrak is interested in direct service to Louisville. This will be the first passenger service between Indianapolis and the Louisville area since the early 1970's, and the first service to the Louisville area from anywhere since 1979.

Federal Transit Administrator Gordon Linton left his post at the end of October. He was the longest serving Administrator the FTA has had, having begun in 1993. Linton is leaving to form his own consulting firm specializing in transportation and innovative financing. He previously was a member of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives. Linton led the FTA during an important time for transit in general, which was marked both by new opportunities made by the 1991 ISTEA law, and the successful effort to keep and expand pro-transit elements of ISTEA in the 1998 TEA-21 law. He addressed the NARP board at its October 1994 meeting in Portland, Me.

Nuria Fernandez was named acting Transit Administrator by Transportation Secretary Rodney Slater on November 5. She had been a deputy administrator since July 1997. She has also been a budget assistant in the Clinton DOT and a planner for the Chicago and Washington transit agencies.

The FTA gave its approval November 5 for a light rail project between downtown Houston and the Astrodome. The Metro transit authority approved it in September. Because of the FTA action, Metro may proceed with preliminary engineering.

With 2000 less than a month away, transit agencies are preparing for the arrival of a new dollar coin. The new gold-colored Sacagawea dollar will replace the Susan B. Anthony dollar minted in 1979 and 1980. As vending machines -- including transit ticket machines -- requiring dollar coins have proliferated in the past few years, the supply of Anthony dollars has finally been nearly depleted, even though more were minted in 1999. The U.S. Mint says the new coin will match the dimensions and weight of the old one, so ticket machines should not need to be reconfigured.

VIA Rail Canada will be changing its schedules January 16. One bright spot in that is the restoration of a Toronto-Montreal overnight rain, daily except Saturday, to be called the Enterprise. This is similar to the Cavalier that was discontinued in 1990. A more negative schedule change is to have the Monday-Saturday westbound International leave Toronto 80 minutes earlier than now, but without changing the schedule in Michigan -- meaning through-passengers have an additional 80 minutes to sit doing nothing in Port Huron. The International will not connect at Toronto with the Enterprise in either direction.

Amtrak will energize 27 miles of catenary between New London and Old Lyme, Conn., on December 6.

The State of Maine is moving forward with plans for passenger rail extensions, even before the first regular Amtrak passenger train reaches Portland. In November, the state hired a Massachusetts engineering firm to upgrade the 56-mile line between Brunswick and Rockland. The cost is $33 million. Current track speed is 10 mph, but the state wants to raise it to 60 mph, providing a 75-minute trip (compared to two hours on parallel US 1 during peak summer periods). Service could start in 2002 or 2003.

A proposal for a commuter line running northwest from Orlando to Tavares and Eustis got a good review this week from the Florida "Year 2000 Fast Track Selection Team," a panel that screens projects vying for the remnants of funding that was dedicated to the high-speed rail project killed by Governor Bush at the beginning of the year. If an initial $8-million recommendation gets approval, the project could get track and signal money as early as summer 2000.