Group looks to shift project to state

An alliance that has spent five years planning a 155-mile high-speed passenger rail line connecting Minneapolis and Duluth is looking to wrap up its work and hand the project over to the state.

The transition isn’t expected to come immediately but was signaled Wednesday when the Northern Lights Express Passenger Rail Alliance met to discuss the 2013 budget. Group members said that they wanted to consider using more of their $270,000 reserve over the next two years and begin winding down their involvement with the project.

The Northern Lights group includes representatives from Hennepin, Isanti, Pine, St. Louis and Lake counties as well as the cities of Duluth and Minneapolis, where the line would terminate at the transit hub under construction next to Target Field.

The 2013 budget proposal calls for spending $295,000 in local contributions and reserves on lobbying, advertising materials, legal work and administration. It will be discussed again at a Sept. 26 meeting.

The budget talk comes two months after Anoka County officials voted to withdraw from the alliance amid concerns that the line would underperform and the county would end up subsidizing service. The Anoka County Regional Rail Authority gave Northern Lights $46,000 in 2012 and $450,000 over the course of its five-year involvement.

Bob Manzoline, executive director of the St. Louis and Lake Counties Regional Rail Authority, said Thursday that the group’s focus on reserve funds doesn’t signal any broader dissatisfaction among local partners.

Alliance members had always intended to prepare the estimated $1 billion project for preliminary engineering and pass the project off to the state, he said. The two-year, $8 million preliminary engineering process could begin in January.

That work — funded by the state and federal governments — will set the stage for final design and construction. No money is set aside for construction, but Manzoline said the group is getting good feedback from the Federal Railroad Administration, which is expected to pay up to 90 percent of the construction costs.

“I’d say we’re pretty well-grounded,” Manzoline said. “We haven’t found any fatal flaws, or anything that can’t be overcome.”

If built, the line would restore passenger service for the first time since Amtrak stopped running between St. Paul and Duluth in 1985.

A study outlining fare structures and possible subsidy needs is due by April 2013. Proponents hope fares will cover most of the $30 million in annual operation costs, but detractors remain skeptical.

A 2007 feasibility study showed 110-mph trains making eight two-hour trips a day could generate 889,000 passenger rides a year. TEMS Inc. of Frederick, Md., and SRF Consulting Group Inc. and Krech Ojard & Associates, both of Minneapolis, conducted the study.

In exiting the alliance, Anoka County officials said they thought those numbers painted too rosy of a picture. The travel time, which shaves perhaps 30 minutes off an automobile trip, and small populations in northern Minnesota are behind the concerns.

The Northern Lights Express is not the only planned high-speed rail line that would bring service to the Twin Cities.

A 400-mile, $2 billion link to Chicago is also planned. A $2.5 million environmental review of the route is due by the end of 2013. The study will set the stage for preliminary engineering, which could take another three years and cost between $7 million and $20 million.

Because no funding has been committed and Wisconsin officials have said they do not want to participate in the project, officials are also looking at adding another Amtrak train from St. Paul to Chicago. A study of how much it would cost to add the service is due in January.

A two-year feasibility study of a high-speed line between Minneapolis and Rochester will also begin next month. The study is paid for with $2 million in state bonding and a $300,000 contribution from the Olmsted County Regional Rail Authority.

Dan Krom, director of the Minnesota Department of Transportation’s passenger rail office, said the Rochester line could take decades to develop because it involves building new infrastructure, rather than adding service to an existing corridor.

While the state’s passenger rail projects are admittedly slow to develop, Krom said it is important to continue planning so that the state is ready once funding is offered.

“We have to keep these projects moving forward so that when federal money becomes available we’ll be eligible,” he said. “It does take time, though. These are long-term projects, no doubt about it.”