Metro Cross County (green line) construction/progress

matguy70 · PostDec 19, 2004#12004-12-19T18:36+00:00

The new line is scehuled to open late 2005 or very early 2006. Construction on the line is looking great and what an incredible addition to the city. METRO, since opening the first line in 1993 has grown to offering transit rail in St. Louis to near 45 miles and three lines since opening. The main line serves Lambert St. Louis Internetional airport and the central cooridor of the city from Forest Park to downtown and crossing over to East St. Louis and extending onto the St. Clair line to the Metro East of the suburban Illinois areas. The new line will extend at the Forest Park station through the Clayton business district and Galleria area then southward into St. Louis County and ending in Shrewsbury at the South City (proper) line.

Progress continues on the $550-million Green Subway/elevated Line (aka Cross County) through Clayton and Mid St. Louis County/south city areas.

photos by: Arch City of skyscraperpage forums

MattnSTL · PostDec 19, 2004#22004-12-19T20:15+00:00

The pics actually originally come from the cross county website. You can see even more at http://www.crosscountymetro.org/const_photos.asp, including some newer ones. It is really coming along nicely.

matguy70 · PostOct 25, 2005#32005-10-25T21:24+00:00

http://www.metrostlouis.org/MetroNews/P ... allest.pdf

southslider · PostOct 26, 2005#42005-10-26T13:43+00:00

This is certainly late notice, but if you're downtown, you might want to head over to the KMOX/KMOV Gateway Tower, where Larry Salci, Metro's CEO will give a presentation to East-West Gateway's Board of Directors at 10am, regarding Cross-County progress.

Here's the agenda:

http://www.ewgateway.org/pdffiles/agend ... urrent.pdf

PostOct 26, 2005#52005-10-26T16:03+00:00

Actually, Salci's presentation was more so about the financial deficit facing Metro's future. And the biggest culprit is the state of Missouri, providing only 1% of Metro's operating budget. Missouri ranks 34th in transit spending, while Illinois ranks 8th.

Here is a Post-Dispatch article sharing the dire situation.

Despite spin by mostly transit opponents, MetroLink is not to blame. The rail system has only one-tenth of the operators of the bus fleet, three times the annual growth in boardings, higher average revenue-mile fare recovery, and enhances overall system ridership on connecting buses.

Since the late 1990s, the feds got out of the business of subsidizing operations, providing now only formula grants that Metro mostly uses for fleet maintenance. On both sides of the river, local governments have helped pick up the tab with sales taxes, but the state of Illinois is contributing nearly 60 times as much subsidy per capita (transit district population) as Missouri. 60 times?!

If Shrewsbury ends up being the end of the line for Missouri MetroLink expansion, it will be Missouri to blame. Locals already picking up the tab for capital costs, now will have to divert potential future capital revenues to operations that most other states, especially those with major urban areas, help subsidize.

Case in point: Without a Missouri increase, an additional quarter-cent sales tax in the City and County would only sustain operations, not pay for any expansion. Even worse, without a Missouri or a City/County increase, service and labor would have to be cut.