I’m curious, so I’d appreciate some participation on this one even if it’s months after it’s posted.
The current administration is putting some focus on public transit, largely in the form of financial support for passenger rail. Illinois and Iowa have signed a Memorandum of Agreement, making rail between Chicago, the Quad Cities, and Iowa City a solid candidate for funding. Iowa City is already making steps to prepare for passenger rail into their city by selecting a site for the depot.
It’s a bummer that Cedar Rapids isn’t currently positioned for our own direct link to Chicago, but I guess we can be slightly consoled that a connection will be close. In light of this, I’m wondering how many people would take advantage of this and if public transit from Cedar Rapids to Iowa City should be involved. It certainly seems like a transit connection from passenger rail in Iowa City to Cedar Rapids would help bring the visitors up north, but would citizens in Cedar Rapids, and south to Iowa City, also use a bus or light rail system to get to Iowa City?
I know there are stipulations involved in my own choice to use such a system. Things like frequency, how late it runs, cost, trip length, and stop locations. If this is something others in the area are interested in, then I think it at least warrants discussions between the corridor cities so we can make decisions, about depot designs for example, that can integrate the area and take full advantage of the infrastructure headed our way.
Take the poll to provide some rough data and feel free to leave a comment with more details about your own stipulations and thoughts.
Tags: cedar rapids, corridor, Iowa City, rail
2009-09-28 at 11:56 pm |
I’ve lived in Iowa City for years. I like both the idea of a train between IC and Chicago and between IC and Cedar Rapids. How often I would use it would depend on various factors such as cost and schedules, but I would use it. I don’t know how many others would use it as much as I might because I’m atypical in not owning a car.