DETROIT - Crain's Detroit Business reports Dan Gilbert's Quicken Loans trademarked the name "RocketRail" not long after postponing a naming announcement for the M-1 Rail streetcar in Detroit.

Officials said in November "The streetcar's name will be announced at a later date as we have some additional steps to complete in the process ... construction continues on schedule as we build toward passenger operations in 2017."

Crain's quotes M-1 spokesman Dan Lijana as saying "The naming selection is going to be part of a larger announcement in early 2016 and, as we indicated when the announcement was postponed prior to Thanksgiving, there are many steps involved in selecting the name and we are still in the process of completing those steps."

RocketRail was trademarked Dec. 3, Crain's reports.

Dan Gilbert, the founder of Quicken Loans, bought the naming rights to the rail.

He has contributed about $10 million to the project, which is expected to be up and running in 2017.

Construction should wrap in late 2016, but the cars have to go through a series of tests and certifications.

The $140-million project will stretch 3.3 miles along Woodward Avenue between the city's downtown and New Center neighborhoods.

In the works since 2008, the M1 Rail first was envisioned as a 9-mile Light Rail Transit system stretching from near the Detroit River to 8 Mile Road. But, in 2011, that plan was scrapped in favor of the 3.3-mile line, for fiscal reasons.

The rail is on the tail end of its biggest phase of construction in Detroit. Through the summer and fall, crews leap-frogged down Woodward Avenue in midtown at the same time a second group is laying the tracks in Detroit's Campus Martius Park.

The Penske Technical Center in New Center (at the end of the rail line) also is being built.

In the release canceling the naming event, Lijana said M-1 Rail will have a float in America's Thanksgiving Parade this year, sponsored by Quicken Loans.

Ian Thibodeau is the business and development reporter for MLive Media Group in Detroit. He can be reached at ithibode@mlive.com, or follow him on Twitter.