Airport-Downtown Rail Line Proposed

[News]

New Task Force will Explore Airport-Downtown Rail Connection

Published on February 19, 2014 6:00 pm

By: Walker

In addition to the many small-yet-important initiatives announced at tonight’s State of the City address, Columbus Mayor Michael Coleman called upon the development of a new task force that is being charged with improving the economic vitality of Port Columbus International Airport. That includes research into the feasibility of passenger rail service connecting Downtown to Port Columbus.

“The airport is located between three major job centers and tourist destinations — Downtown, Easton and the Ohio State University,” said Coleman in tonight’s address. “Yet neither our tourists nor our residents can take public mass transit to any of them from the airport. In fact, you cannot even take a bus directly from Port Columbus to Downtown without a transfer.”

READ MORE: https://www.columbusunderground.com/new-task-force-will-explore-airport-downtown-rail-connection

[jbcmh81]

Kind of expected a lot more comments on this. Perhaps we’ve been fooled too many times to trust such news.

[derm]

It would be a major benefit. I can get a fixed rate cab from Grandview for 25 and a fixed rate run back for ten bucks more than that, but the other options are the Thrifty lot or long terms. It would be a great improvement for a direct rail line, especially one with a park and ride, and absolute insanity there is no direct bus line from downtown to the airport.

[Walker Evans]

jbcmh81 said:
Kind of expected a lot more comments on this. Perhaps we’ve been fooled too many times to trust such news.

Give it a little time. Announced late in the day. And details are very very scarce.

[honestlyinsincere]

Isn’t the fact that COTA can’t even fill a bus to go from Downtown to the Airport and back a clue that a rail line would be misplaced investment? Are the people just going to come out of the woodwork to ride this rail line? The transit should go where the people are. We should focus on commuter transit investment before this type of project.

[JimboJones34]

This seems like a complete and utter waste of time and money. It would be a boondoggle just like the BS streetcar would have been. But if the mayor does want this, I suggest he pay for it with the $$$ he made on his ridiculous income tax hike a few years back that he foisted on those who actually earn income (and who, for the most part, cannot actually vote in City elections). His penchant for taxes and lack of services prompted my wife and me to leave German Village for Westerville.

Just know that if this would ever appear on the ballot as a County issue, I will be only too eager to vote against it.

[Chris Sunami]

honestlyinsincere said:
Isn’t the fact that COTA can’t even fill a bus to go from Downtown to the Airport and back a clue that a rail line would be misplaced investment? Are the people just going to come out of the woodwork to ride this rail line? The transit should go where the people are. We should focus on commuter transit investment before this type of project.

Sometimes you have to build for the future, not the past. With Cleveland losing their air hub, this project seems right on time to me.

[JimboJones34]

How does Cleveland losing it’s United hub make this proposal a wise investment? United is not going to move that hub to Columbus.

[honestlyinsincere]

ChrisSunami said:
Sometimes you have to build for the future, not the past. With Cleveland losing their air hub, this project seems right on time to me.

The project is definitely right on time as the city postures to get a political convention. I wouldn’t say that United’s departure from Cleveland would have a considerable impact on Columbus air traffic. I definitely understand the idea of building for the future, but it is hard for me to imagine Columbus ever entering the North American stage as a truly competitive conference destination. People don’t want to go to places for conferences that are just like where they’re from.

Building for the future should mean building for our citizens, not in an attempt to attract convention and visitor business-that’s not what our economy is built on. Certainly conventions and tourism are important to our city, but they don’t constitute a large junk of our metro’s economic output. Obviously I have no numbers to support this assertion…so prove me wrong if I am!

[MHJ]

A line linking downtown, OSU, Easton and the airport sounds like a good start to me.

[JAL]

JimboJones34 said:
How does Cleveland losing it’s United hub make this proposal a wise investment? United is not going to move that hub to Columbus.

United closing CLE as a hub helps CMH because those people who live between Columbus and Cleveland in cities along the I-71/I-77 corridor such as Ashland, Mansfield, and Wooster to name a few drive to CLE over CMH to get more nonstop destinations. Losing a lot of those nonstop cities now puts CMH on a competitive playing field with Cleveland to draw more of those passengers. It doesn’t have anything to do with grabbing the hub.

[Walker Evans]

honestlyinsincere said:
Building for the future should mean building for our citizens, not in an attempt to attract convention and visitor business-that’s not what our economy is built on.

Connecting the Airport to Downtown would serve more than just convention attendees. There are plenty of business travelers and non-convention guests at the large concentration of hotels Downtown.

Having easy rail-based access directly to the Airport would also make Downtown a more attractive place to do business for the types of companies with plenty of travelers.

[Walker Evans]

MHJ said:
A line linking downtown, OSU, Easton and the airport sounds like a good start to me.

Unfortunately, there’s no existing freight rail line that runs from OSU to Downtown to the Airport to Easton. Perhaps the right type of rolling stock could shift between freight rail lines and shared-lane rail on certain streets (Stelzer? High or Neil?) but that would also slow service Down from end-to-end. Would certainly make the whole system more attractive to have more major destinations along the way.

[michaelcoyote]

Interesting. I wonder what alignment they’re thinking of.

While I’m not really a fan of airport connectors, they can be useful to help sell a rail project (like LA Metro Crenshaw line). I’d love to see a plan to connect downtown to some place other than the airport in Phase 1.

Easton could be useful and has good utility as a park and ride for people and could connect w/ East side employers via shuttle.

Also wondering what stops they my be thinking of in between the airport and downtown.

Good luck y’all, I’ll be rooting for you from way over here..

[geoyui]

honestlyinsincere said:
Building for the future should mean building for our citizens, not in an attempt to attract convention and visitor business-that’s not what our economy is built on.

I see that it does serve our citizens. On top of all the travellers Walker mentioned, you have thousands of citizens who work within the vicinity of Port Columbus.

[Author]

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