Train to the Mountain: Feasible, but . . .

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Posted by David Seago @ 05:45:49 pm

Ducked into a Tacoma City Council committee meeting today to catch the results of a feasibility study for the long-hoped-for Train to the Mountain.

The word from consultants: It's feasible. But . . .

The biggest "but" is that it would cost $11 million to upgrade Tacoma Rail's track from Freighthouse Square to Elbe, and $24.3 million if route is extended to Ashford – the National Park Service's preferred terminus. And Tacoma Rail (http://www.tacomarail.com/)has nowhere near that amount of money available.

But Tacoma Rail Director Paula Henry (http://www.ci.tacoma.wa.us/tpu/News%20Rel/News%20Rel%202005/september_15_05.htm)wants to start seeking state and federal grants for track upgrades; the improvements would also serve Tacoma Rail's efforts to do more freight hauling on the Mountain Division line. The consultants recommended Tacoma Rail seek a private company to operate the tourist train.

The tourist train won't succeed unless the trip each way – the train ride plus a shuttle bus ride to Paradise at Mount Rainier National Park – can be done in less than three hours, the consultants said. Presently the tracks are in such poor condition that the tourist train would be much too slow.

The consultants also said ticket prices would run $80 to $120 for adults and for $60 to $100 for children. An on-board entertainment program would be essential. Not hard to see why.

I've long been skeptical of the Train to the Mountain vision. I don't think the route is very thrilling. But if Tacoma Rail can scare up grants for the upgrades and a private company is willing to assume the financial risks of operating the service, it might be worth a try. The best argument for it might be the boost upgraded tracks would give Tacoma Rail's freight business. (Not speaking for the ed board here, I might add).

Side note: The Spirit of the Mountain Dinner Train (http://www.thenewstribune.com/business/story/86821.html), which switched to a Tacoma-to-Kapowsin route on Tacoma Rail tracks last summer, ran at 80 percent occupancy.

source: http://blogs.thenewstribune.com/oped/2007/10/09/train_to_the_mountain_feasible_but

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MIKE ARCHBOLD
The News Tribune
Published: December 2nd, 2007 01:00 AM


Imagine bicyclists, walkers and trains someday journeying together along the 47-mile Tacoma Rail line between downtown Tacoma and Elbe, the gateway town to Mount Rainier.

That’s the vision contained in a 58-page study that examines adding a paved trail next to the train tracks in the low-volume freight corridor.

But could bicyclists and walkers safely share the same route with trains?

Yes, concludes the recently completed study sponsored by Tacoma Rail, Mount Rainier National Park and Pierce County Parks and Recreation. It was unveiled last week at the ForeverGreen Council’s third annual Pierce County Trails Conference.

And despite the $72.5 million price tag, it tickled the imaginations of trail advocates.

“I think it’s a very real possibility,” said Ernie Bay, one of the godfathers of pedestrian trails in Pierce County. “It’s one a lot of us have fantasized about.”

The cost of any paved trail is staggering, he agreed, but it’s a long-term investment.


PRECEDENT SET


The county already has one trail-with-rail: the five-mile extension of the Foothills Trail from Alderton-McMillin to Puyallup. The paved path was built within a railroad right of way the county bought alongside an active but little-used railroad spur.

Nationally, there were more than 60 trail-with-rail projects in 2001, according to the Rails-to-Trails Conservancy. Its 2006 report on safety found only one incident between a trail user and a train.

Brian Bowden, a planner with Mount Rainier National Park, said the trail-with-rail study is one of a number of feasibility studies funded by the National Park Service to see if the City of Tacoma’s dream of a “Train to the Mountain” can become a reality.

Other studies looked at updating tracks and equipment, options for excursion trains and a rural transportation system from Eatonville to the park.

“The bottom line is that it is feasible,” Bowden said, referring to a trail-with-rail. “We see a range of transportation alternatives for the park.”

Tacoma bought the rail corridor in 1995 and has been trying ever since to determine how to use it. The latest venture was a failed effort this year by The Spirit of Washington Dinner Train. Economics forced it to stop in October, after about three months running from Freighthouse Square to Kapowsin.

Bowden said the national park and the city have a shared interest in the rail route. Mount Rainier officials want alternatives to cars entering the park and polluting the air; the city wants a mixed-rail line for tourists and freight.


THE COMPATIBILITY FACTOR


Chris Gleason, a spokeswoman for Tacoma Rail, said it wanted to make sure a rail line and a trail were compatible. She said the study says it can be done.

Curt Warber is a senior planner with Parametrix, the engineering and planning firm that conducted the study. He told the group Thursday night in Puyallup that the trail, with its connection to Mount Rainier, could become a national resource and provide economic benefits and commuting options to communities along its route.

Graham and Frederickson are two fast-growing residential and industrial centers where traffic patterns are problematic, and where promises of a cross-base highway have gone unrealized.

Warber said a major plus for the project is that the City of Tacoma owns the corridor, so buying rights of way would be less of a factor.

The Foothills Trail in East Pierce County, by contrast, has seen delays and higher costs because of the challenges of working with private landowners. Warber said the cost per mile would be about $1.3 million.

Trail costs, he said, depend on route conditions. The Foothills Trail was built for less than $500,000 a mile, but it was built on a flat rail bed. The East Lake Sammamish Trail in King County cost more than $2 million a mile.

Warber took members of the group on a photographic trip up the route to the mountain – from Mile 0 at Freighthouse Square, south through urban neighborhoods and out into the rural countryside of Pierce County.


LOGISTICAL PROBLEMS


The paved, 10-foot wide trail would be separated from the train and its tracks by fencing and landscape barriers. On steep slopes, the trail could be raised higher than the tracks. On bridges, it could be cantilevered off one side.

The major problems with the trail would emerge shortly after leaving Freighthouse Square. The rail track goes under Interstate 705 through a passageway too narrow for both a train and a trail.

One solution, Warber said, is to create an on-street bike lane up over Interstate 5 via the McKinley Overpass and then east through the McKinley neighborhood, back to the rail line.

South of Highway 512, the corridor opens up.

“It’s really a great travel route,” Warber said. “It’s green. There are a lot of backyards shielded by landscaping, some streams and wetlands.”

The trail would touch Midland, Frederickson, the Graham-Kapowsin area and Eatonville. At one point, it would connect to the Foothills Trail.

Warber said environmental challenges are high in the Lake Kapowsin area, with its steep slopes and forests. The Mashell River canyon itself offers trail views that would be a draw for bicyclists and hikers from all over the Puget Sound region, he added.

After the presentation, Warber said the people he talked to were excited about the trail, yet still realistic.

“They recognized a project that will take decades to be built,” he said. “But trails tend to get built piece by piece.”

from: http://www.thenewstribune.com/front/topstories/story/218562.html

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Train to the mountain’ still on the tracks
JASON HAGEY
The News Tribune
Published: December 5th, 2007 01:00 AM

Tacoma City Council members appeared divided Tuesday over the wisdom of spending more money for a long-sought tourist “train to the mountain” after hearing that it could cost as much as $24 million to upgrade the track.
The City of Tacoma bought a railroad in the mid-1990s with hopes of building a profitable freight business to subsidize a tourist train from Freighthouse Square to a point near the entrance of Mount Rainier National Park.

But rather than subsidizing a tourist train, the Mountain Division freight line has itself become a drain on the city’s general fund and council members are eager to transfer it from general government to Tacoma Public Utilities, which operates the larger and more successful Tidelands Division of Tacoma Rail.

The Mountain Division has $4.55 million in outstanding loans from the city’s general fund, and is asking for an additional $1.7 million. In addition, it has $2 million of outside debt.

Councilman Jake Fey said the money that’s being used to subsidize the Mountain Division could be spent on essential city services. “We can go along and go along and go along,” Fey said. “We need to have a hard look at this soon.”

Councilman Mike Lonergan expressed similar concerns, and noted the recent failure of the Spirit of Washington dinner train.

The dinner train used the Mountain Division line, but operators shut it down in October after less than three months.

Other council members defended the money spent on the Mountain Division, calling it an investment rather than a subsidy. And they said the dinner train wasn’t a fair comparison, in part because it ended at Lake Kapowsin and lacked a true destination.

Councilman Tom Stenger said the now-profitable rail operation at the Tideflats was a money-loser for years, but proved to be a worthwhile investment because of the growth it allowed at the Port of Tacoma. Mayor Bill Baarsma and Councilman Rick Talbert also spoke about the potential for economic development that the Mountain Division could bring about.

Utility board members aren’t clamoring to take it over despite claims that it has the potential to become profitable if development flourishes in Frederickson, Eatonville and other places along the line.

Bob Casey, utility board chairman, told council members during Tuesday’s joint study session that his board does not favor taking over the line unless there is a business plan in place that showed it would not need to be subsidized by Tacoma Rail’s successful Tidelands operation. Board member Laura Fox suggested one way to make such a transfer more appealing would be to erase the Mountain Division debt.

Bill Gaines, Tacoma Public Utilities director, said he will be attempting to negotiate a transfer within the first six months of next year.

The discussion came as City Council and Utility Board members reviewed a federally funded feasibility study on the tourist train. The study by David Evans and Associates concluded:

• The train is feasible as long as the one-way travel time to Paradise is three hours or less.

• In order to be successful, the train would need to capture just 1 percent of the roughly 1.5 million visitors the national park receives each year.

• Upgrading the track to Elbe would cost just $11 million, while extending it to Ashford would cost approximately $24 million. In either case, visitors would ride a shuttle bus to Paradise.

• Tacoma Rail should start looking for a third-party operator interested in running the train, and Tacoma officials should continue to seek federal funding to pay for track improvements.

• A tourist train would provide park visitors with an environmentally sensitive alternative to the automobile.

Jason Hagey: 253-597-8542

jason.hagey@thenewstribune.com

blogs.thenewstribune.com/politics

PEDESTRIAN TRAIL TO RAINIER

Safety experts and engineers say it’s possible to build a paved trail for pedestrians alongside active train tracks between Tacoma and Mount Rainier. To read the story that ran Sunday in The News Tribune, go to tinyurl.com/22fdrq.

from: http://www.thenewstribune.com/news/government/story/221207.html