METRO breaks ground on North, Southeast light rail lines

Hutchison headlines speakers

Steve Hawley, Jul 13, 09.

The Metropolitan Transit Authority of Harris County (METRO) held groundbreaking ceremonies Monday morning to commemorate the expansion of the light rail along the North and Southeast corridors. Hundreds of people attended the events, which were headlined by US Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, Reps. Al Green, Gene Green, and Sheila Jackson-Lee, and Mayor Bill White. Seven Houston City Council members were also in attendance, as well as several state officials.

METRO hosted two simultaneous ceremonial groundbreakings, one at the Palm Center and the other at the Northline Mall, followed by a joint ceremony at Union Station in Minute Maid Park.

Sen. Hutchison noted that the region is expected to add 2.6 million people by 2025, saying, “If we are going to have the kind of growth that maintains our current quality of life, we must have mass transit as a component of our transportation system. It will not be the same if we don’t.” She added, “The next thing that we’ve got to do at the state level is high-speed rail,” eliciting applause from the crowd. “We’ve got to connect Houston to the rest of Texas,” she said, throwing her support behind the Texas T-Bone proposal.

Gerald Smith, Vice Chair of the METRO board, told the audience at the Palm Center, “Considering how auto-dependent Houston is, you may not realize that our city has been intrinsically linked to rail since its infancy,” noting that the City of Houston seal is centered around a locomotive. “Today, Houston needs rail again, not to move commerce but to move people. Our population is simply growing faster than our roads can accommodate.”

Rep. Jackson-Lee told the crowd that the light rail expansion is “in lockstep with [President Obama’s] vision” for a green economy, and Rep. Al Green said that the projects would create 60,000 jobs, of which 35 percent would be targeted toward small businesses and minority-owned businesses. David Wolff, chairman of METRO’s board, said that the light rail “will improve air quality, it will improve mobility, [and] it will change the way the city looks and feels.”

Noting that two mayoral candidates were in attendance - City Council member Peter Brown and former City Attorney Gene Locke - Wolff took aim at a 1990s decision to divert one-quarter of METRO’s one cent sales tax revenues to city and county road projects, saying, “METRO should be able to recover its birthright that the voters approved.” He suggested phasing out the diversion over five years, and said that without the full sales tax revenue, Houston could never compete with Dallas. “It’s something that should be part of the upcoming mayoral election,” he concluded.

Other elected officials in the audience included City Council members Wanda Adams, Brown, Ed Gonzalez, Jolanda Jones, MJ Khan, Sue Lovell, and James Rodriguez, as well as Texas Sen. Mario Gallegos and Texas Reps. Carol Alvarado and Armando Walle. Speakers also thanked Texas Reps. Garnet Coleman and Sylvester Turner for their help.

METRO signed a $1.46 billion design-build-operate contract in March to begin work on the East End, North, and Southeast lines, as well as to conduct preliminary work along the Uptown corridor. A separate contract will cover the University Line and the remainder of the Uptown corridor. METRO President and CEO Frank Wilson told the City Council Transportation, Infrastructure, and Aviation Committee on Friday that the University Line is at least nine months behind the other lines.

The Main Street line currently carries 40,000 passengers per day, making it one of the most successful light rail systems in the country. By 2030, METRO projects that the expansion lines will add an additional 129,000 riders to the system, according to Texas Cable News, including 29,000 on the North corridor and 28,750 along the Southeast corridor. The expansion lines are scheduled to open in 2012.

Top, left to right: METRO Vice Chair Gerald Smith, City Council Member Wanda Adams, US Rep. Sheila Jackson-Lee, and US Rep. Al Green drive ceremonial stakes into the ground at the Palm Center along the Southeast Corridor.
Middle: US Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison speaks at Union Station in Minute Maid Park.
Bottom, left to right: Confetti showers Union Station as the ceremonies conclude. US Reps. Sheila Jackson-Lee, Gene Green, and Al Green look on with the David Wolff, chair of the METRO board, and Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison.