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HomeMy WebLinkAboutEmail - Mail Packet - 2/14/2013DATE: February 14, 2013 TO: Mayor & Councilmembers FROM: Darin Atteberry RE: FYI /du From: Sara R. Thompson Cassidy [mailto:stcassidy@up.com] Sent: Tuesday, February 12, 2013 6:14 PM To: Darin Atteberry; Timothy Kemp Subject: train op-ed in Sunday's Post Hi, Darrin and Tim. Just a heads up related to the op-ed in Sunday's Denver Post - FYI, UP responded with a brief letter to the editor, copied below. Here is a link to the column: http://www.denveri)ost.com/opinion/ci 22544445/stopped-their-tracks I have shared this response with my colleagues at BNSF and GW. I'll stay in touch with you as needed as things come up in Fort Collins. Please do the same, and feel free to call me if you want more info about our response - 303-405-5010. Best regards, Sara Sara Thompson Cassidy Director of Public Affairs, CO and WY Union Pacific Railroad 1400 West 52nd Avenue, Bldg 12591 Denver, CO 80221 Tel:303-405-5010 ICell:720-357-2215 lEmail:stcassidvPup.com February 12, 2013 Letter to the Editor Denver Post Re: Front Range cities like Fort Collins strain to co -exist with trains — Feb. 10, 2013 Dear Editor, I am writing in response to the opinion column entitled "Front Range cities like Fort Collins strain to co -exist with trains" by John Young, which appeared in The Denver Post on Sunday, Feb. 10, 2013. Fort Collins is served by three railroads, BNSF Railway, Great Western Railway of Colorado and Union Pacific Railroad. Union Pacific operates one train Monday through Friday from La Salle, Colo., delivering and picking up rail cars from the Great Western Railway at Fort Collins and Milliken, Colo. It also serves our customer Holcim Cement twice weekly. Union Pacific train crews are mindful of Fort Collins' motorist and make every effort to quickly and safely drop off and pick up railcars at Great Western Railway at Lemay Avenue. Additionally, Union Pacific takes pride in our involvement with local planning and traffic engineering efforts. More specifically, we are pleased to work with Fort Collins on roadway and pedestrian improvements, including the current street widening project at Harmony Road. Sara Thompson Cassidy Union Pacific Railroad Director, Public Affairs — Colorado and Wyoming This email and any attachments may contain information that is confidential and/or privileged for the sole use of the intended recipient. Any use, review, disclosure, copying, distribution or reliance by others, and any forwarding of this email or its contents, without the express permission of the sender is strictly prohibited by law. If you are not the intended recipient, please contact the sender immediately, delete the e-mail and destroy all copies. Front Range cities like Fort Collins strain to co -exist with trains - The Denver Post Page 1 of 3 Front Range cities like Fort Collins strain to co -exist with trains By John Young The Denver Post Posted. DenverPost.com My fellow Fort. Collins residents and I have an admission to make. For two years running, we were "America's Safest Driving City," according to the Allstate Insurance Co., and this year we ranked third in the country. Each an honor, yes, but fraudulent It's not that Fort Collins' drivers aren't cautious or kind. It's just that it is relatively easy to avoid collisions when traffic doesn't move. Blame trains. Everyone does in Fort Collins. The Choice City is not alone, however. Train -caused traffic delays are a major problem up and down the Front Range as population grows. There is more to Fort Collins' love of bicycles and its growing infatuation with a fine bus system than all the good and green things associated therewith. Traffic congestion here is increasingly acute as it grows south and north, an elongated metro area lengthening by the month. Add to this the fact that traffic on the city's main artery, College Avenue (U.S. 287) is stopped routinely by the Burlington Northern Santa Fe rail line. Want to beat the train? Fort Collins' other crucial artery, Lemay Avenue, a few blocks to the east, can be stopped by a Union Pacific train at busy Riverside Avenue, within walking distance of Poudre Valley Hospital. (To avoid having ambulances from the hospital cut off by the trains, the Poudre Valley system keeps an ambulance stationed on the north side of town.) The backups at Lemay are a manifestation of growth, a population . 143,986 in 2010 — that gets a 1.9 percent bump annually. Forty years ago, when it was barely developed, Lemay didn't serve as a north -south corridor. It stopped at the tracks. Now it is one of Fort Collins' most important arteries, and at times a motorist can spend 10 to 25 minutes at the rail crossing at Riverside and Lemay. Signs urge motorists to shut off engines and chill. Easy for a sign to say. If they had their druthers, city planners and residents would have the three railroads that intersect the town doing most of their locomoting out on the plains: Or, if druthers came with unlimited funds, they'd build grade separations (overpasses, underpasses), and be done with the matter. http://www.denverpost.com/opinion/ci_22544445/stopped-their-tracks 2/13/2013 Front Range cities like Fort Collins strain to co -exist with trains - The Denver Post Page 2 of 3, Fort Collins has but one grade separation, at Trilby Road. This is easy to explain, as an overpass can cost more than $20 million, and neither the railroads nor the state are obligated to help in the matter. In 2007, the city assembled a study group to look at the train problem in its entirety. Participants were aware that the Colorado Department of Transportation was studying the same matter. The city study's focus was not just congestion and traffic delays but also the noise of train horns, with safety issues associated with crossings, and with hazardous materials in transport. The study found that:blockages of longer than 10 minutes were common at the Lemay-Riverside crossing, with the longest recorded wait being 51 minutes. Fort Collins residents would be surprised to find that the increase in train traffic that triggered the '07 study wasn't necessarily serving their city but was fueled in large part by industry in Windsor to the north. At play: a switching operation in Fort Collins by which shipments delivered from Cheyenne, Wyo., by Union Pacific were transferred to the Great Western Railway to complete the trip to Windsor. City officials examine grade separations proposals, but have found most either too costly or not doable for reasons including topography (the Poudre River near the College Avenue -Cherry Street crossing) and the presence of nearby buildings. For a time a few years ago, this left one answer: moving the tracks away from the Fort Collins metro area, and away as well from those communities like Loveland and Longmont to its south. That was a subject of a Colorado Department of Transportation study launched to establish a new north -south rail alignment on Colorado's Eastern Plains. Two matters intervened: cost, $1 billion to $2 billion to build new track; and liability concerns that at least for now would appear to block the possibility of multiple rail lines sharing the Union Pacific tracks that go from Cheyenne through Greeley, Fort Lupton and Brighton through Denver. David Krutsinger, transit rail program manager for CDOT, said that the problems facing Front Range communities like Fort Collins are the fruit of rapid growth in relatively young cities in the West. Cities in the East have had a lot longer to build around and operate with trains. "In the western United States, there hasn't been the time or resources" put to mitigating how trains disrupt daily lives, said Krutsinger. Fort Collins and other cities have not been sitting still regarding some of those problems. One initiative gaining momentum is "quiet zones," where trains come through population centers. The key objective is to cease the earsplitting horns necessary at intersections a major concern with residences nearby. "That's definitely something we hear from citizens," said Fort Collins transportation planner Amy Lewin, who is involved in the city's quiet -zone project. http://www.denverpost.com/opinion/ci_22544445/stopped-their-tracks 2/13/2013 .Front Range cities like Fort Collins strain to co -exist with trains - The Denver Post Page 3 of 3 The key component of quiet -zone intersections is alarms at each intersection intended only to alert approaching motorists, not everyone in a 3,000-foot radius, as is the current standard. These "wayside horns" employ directed sound that serves a far smaller area. To relieve the trains of mandatory whistles before each intersection and still avoid collisions with vehicles, quiet zones also employ four -quadrant gates and raised medians so that motorists don't attempt to drive around the gates. Fort Collins is examining implementing 15 of these crossings at a cost of $3.9 million to $5 million. This is something cities are studying throughout the West. According to the Fort Collins Coloradoan, two similar crossings in Douglas County are projected to cost $800,000. Commerce City was the first in the region to do this in 2008, with quiet -zone arrangements at two intersections. Motorists will be disappointed to know that quiet zones don't necessarily speed up trains through their communities, leaving much more costly grade separations as the only way to resolve such a nuisance. One location in Fort Collins being studied for an overpass, East Vine Drive and Lemay, could be 10 years away at minimum, said city traffic engineer Joe Olson. It could cost $25 million, and only after Lemay is realigned and the intersection is relocated. Before that, the strongest candidate for a grade separation is an underpass at Drake Road just west of College Avenue. But Fort Collins' most problematic intersections look to remain as they are for some time. Meanwhile, city planners look for ways to get more people out of their cars. One such development is a north -south city bus rapid -transit route planned along the Mason Avenue corridor. City engineer Dean Klingner calls it the "retail spine of Fort Collins." One block west of College Avenue, it would intersect the Colorado State University campus. Employing a federal grant, the $87 million project would connect the downtown transport center on Mason and Laporte Avenue with one at the south end of town. For now, the options are to take the long route, or take a book in case a train is in the distance. Longtime newspaperman John Young Oyoungcolumn@gmail.com) is an instructor at Front Range Community College. http://www.denverpost.com/opinion/ci_22544445/stopped-their-tracks 2/13/2013