EXPRESS-BUS SOLUTION

Why the Metro Gold Line is not the solution to traffic congestion in St. Paul:

Congestion is primarily during rush hour and thus the solution must address commuters during typical business hours. Express bus service has been and continues to be the successful, popular solution for commuters during congested rush hours, compared with the proposed exclusive-guideway bus rapid-transit. The express buses currently run only during rush hour, on the shoulder, and are safe. It doesn’t require expensive capital infrastructure cost (like the guideway). Most of all, commuters are anxious to get to work as quickly as possible and the express bus does the job well.

Comparing express-bus travel time with estimated Gold Line EBRT, plus the Green Line, it’s a good 30 minutes faster to go to Minneapolis on the express bus (and that does not account for wait time between BRT and LRT). Just check the schedule. The No. 353 bus gets to St. Paul in 21 minutes, then on to Minneapolis in another 21 minutes, but the Gold Line would take an estimated 26 minutes to get to St. Paul, wait for transfer and then add 46 minutes on the Green Line to Minneapolis: 72 minutes. That’s not going to work for commuters.

Because of how slow the proposed transitway would be, compared with the express bus, wouldn’t it make a lot more sense to expand the existing express bus to provide much faster midday and early evening hours to serve commuters or anyone riding as a “reverse commute”? The only infrastructure would be the $9.1 million Park and Ride at Manning Avenue versus the $420 million capital-build cost of the Gold Line. This might coax some drivers out of their cars knowing they can get home in a reasonable time during the day or if they must work late. Thus, congestion would be reduced.

Therefore, the Gold Line is not a solution to traffic congestion. Commuters will not ride it because it will be too slow.

Linda Stanton, Woodbury

The writer is chair of Citizens for Smart Transit.