Copyright 2000 Star Tribune
Star Tribune
(Minneapolis, MN)
August 3, 2000, Thursday, Metro Edition
Correction Appended
SECTION: NEWS; Getting There;
Pg. 2B
LENGTH: 980 words
HEADLINE: Want to take a test ride on a new
commuter train?;
3 demonstration trips available on
segments of track between Minneapolis and St. Cloud
BYLINE: Laurie Blake; Staff Writer
BODY:
A week from today, a new
commuter train heading for use in Seattle will pass through
Minnesota and take some passengers on a dry run along the
freight line that could someday become the Northstar
commuter line.
The
demonstration will consist of three rides, each carrying about 300 passengers. A
trip for public officials, to which Gov. Jesse Ventura has been invited, will
run early in the morning.
Tickets for the
public will be handed out by about 30 government entities along the line's
proposed route between Minneapolis and St. Cloud.
Minneapolis and Anoka County will issue tickets on
a first-come, first-served basis. In Minneapolis, the contact is City Council
Member Paul Ostrow's office at 612-673-2201. In Anoka County, the tickets will
be distributed from 8 a.m. until noon Saturday at county license bureaus. Call
763-323-5777 for directions.
Specific
information on ticket distribution in other jurisdictions was not available.
Contact officials in your township, city or county for specifics.
A few riders also will be permitted to
board the train without tickets at the stations where it stops. And there will
be ice-cream socials in Minneapolis and St. Cloud at which information about the
line will be available.
The two-car
commuter train that will be on display has been built by Bombardier _ the same
Canadian manufacturer that has been chosen to build rail cars for the planned
Hiawatha Avenue light-rail line between downtown Minneapolis and the Mall of
America. If plans for both the Hiawatha and Northstar lines come to fruition,
the commuter line would connect with the light-rail line behind the Target
Center in downtown Minneapolis.
The
public demonstration, sponsored by the Northstar Corridor Development Authority,
will offer these three trips:
- Trip 1
will leave Elk River, north of Hwy. 10 on 171st Avenue, at noon, stop in Big
Lake south of Hwy. 10 on County Rd. 43. at 12:12 p.m. and arrive at 12:52 p.m.
in St. Cloud, where there will be an ice-cream social, west of Hwy. 10 on E. St.
Germain Street. Riders will take a bus back to their starting point.
- Trip 2 will leave St. Cloud at 1:45 p.m.
and arrive in Big Lake at 2:15 p.m. The train will not return to St. Cloud so
passengers will take a bus back to St. Cloud from Big Lake.
- Trip 3, a round trip, will leave Coon
Rapids from the Foley Boulevard park-and-ride lot, east of East River Road, at
3:15 p.m., stop in Fridley, at 61st Av. and Starlite Blvd., at 3:35 p.m. and
arrive at 4:05 p.m. in downtown Minneapolis, where an ice-cream social will be
held in the parking lot behind the Target Center at 5th St. and 3rd Av. N.
The return trip will begin at 5
p.m., arriving at Fridley at 5:20 p.m. and Coon Rapids at 5:40 p.m.
The idea for a commuter line in the
80-mile Northstar corridor has been under study and under design for several
years and awaits funding approval from the state and federal governments. Next
Thursday's demonstration is designed to help people see how the train would
look, where stops would be and how much it would cost.
"The Northstar Corridor hopes to be in
operation in 2004, and we want people to see what this train is going to look
like," said Tim Yantos, deputy Anoka County administrator.
.
Take a bus to the art fair
The Uptown
Art Fair opens Friday at Lake St. and Hennepin Av. S. Traffic is always a tangle
during the annual event and on-street parking is hard to find.
If you would like to park your car away from the
hubbub, Metro Transit is offering round-trip bus rides for $1 from three
lots:
- Dunwoody Institute, 818 Dunwoody
Blvd.
- Lake Calhoun Executive Building,
3033 Excelsior Blvd.
- The park-and-ride
lot at Interstate Hwy. 394 and Louisiana Av. in St. Louis Park.
Buses will run every 15 minutes from 9:30
a.m. to 8 p.m. Saturday and from 9:30 a.m. to 7 p.m. on Sunday. Fares will be
cash only. There is no additional cost for parking at the lots.
Last year, about 10,000 people rode a bus
to the art fair.
.
Tall median barriers
The Minnesota Department of Transportation is slowly
replacing old 32-inch highway median barriers with taller concrete dividers that
are 4 1/2 feet high. This summer, taller barriers were built on the median of
Hwy. 36 between Interstate Hwy. 35E and Hwy. 95 in Stillwater.
The higher barriers do not allow a view of
the other side of the highway from cars in the lanes closest to them, and some
drivers find them confining. But Transportation Department engineer Don Peterson
said they help with two problems: night glare from oncoming traffic and the
billowing of snow from one side of the highway to the other during plowing.
"You can't see over it, but we are hoping
that people are paying attention to the road rather than the view off to the
left," Peterson said.
The barriers are
used when there is no grassy median in the center of the highway.
.
_ Comments are welcome. In order to be published, comments must include
your full name, community, and day and evening phone numbers. Call:
612-673-9016; e-mail: Gettingthere@startribune.com; fax: 612-673-4359; or send
mail to Getting There, Star Tribune, 425 Portland Av. S., Minneapolis, MN 55488.
The column runs on Thursday.
.
_ Join
the Getting There discussion online at http://www.startribune.com/gettingthere.
.
.
Ride the train
Demonstrations of commuter
rail will be offered Aug. 10 along the proposed route of the Northstar line
between Minneapolis and St. Cloud. There'll be three trips, two of which are one
way and require a return by bus. Tickets will be given out by jurisdictions
along the route. Contact officials in your township, city or county for
specifics.
Sources: Northstar Corridor Development Authority
.
CORRECTIONS
- Two maps on Page B1 Thursday were incorrectly labeled. Cretin Avenue,
not Cleveland Avenue, runs on the western boundary of the two blocks involved in
the University of St. Thomas's proposed expansion.
.
- The phone
number for volunteers for the Jerry Lewis Telethon was incorrectly reported on
Page E1 Thursday. The number is 612-832-5716.
.
- A photograph
of Audrey Chebille, a dancer in the Fringe 2000 performance at the Music Box
Theater this weekend, was misidentified in last Sunday's 8 days out column.
.
- A headline on Page B3 Thursday incorrectly said the
Metropolitan Council approved two light-rail contracts. One was approved for
building cars. The council approved continued negotiations for design and
construction of the 11.4-mile line.
.
- Because of incorrect
information supplied to the newspaper, the address and time were wrong for the
Fridley stop on the Northstar Corridor commuter-train demonstration next
Thursday. The train will stop at 3:45 p.m. at 61st Way NE., accessible from NE.
East River Road.
.
- A paragraph in the Leah Welch obituary on
Page B7 Wednesday incorrectly referred to Evie Kiehl, subject of an obituary on
the same page.
CORRECTION-DATE: August 4, 2000
CORRECTION:
CLARIFICATION
- A theater
review on Page B4 Thursday said Leo Frank, on whose life the musical "Parade"
was written, was lynched after being released from prison. To clarify, a mob
broke into the prison and took him.
GRAPHIC: MAP
LOAD-DATE: August 3, 2000 
