Atlanta’s Transportation List Finalized, Clifton Corridor Gets Most $$
Decatur Metro | October 13, 2011Atlanta’s 21-member regional transportatoin roundtable, made up of politicos from around the 12-county region, finalized the Transportation Investment Act project list today that will go before voters next year.
According to the Atlanta Business Chronicle, the biggest last minute funding “hits” were taken by…
….a planned extension of MARTA’s North rail line to Holcomb Bridge Road in Roswell, which got only $37 million, and a proposed commuter rail line linking Atlanta and Griffin, Ga., which got only $20 million. A planned extension of MARTA rail service along the Interstate 85 corridor in Gwinnett County was cut to $95 million.
Though there was talk of cutting back funding for the Clifton Corridor transit line to help fund a rail extension along I-20, the effort never materialized and the project retained it’s $700 million funding level from the draft list. However, the sole project to receive more money previously – the Midtown to Cobb rail line – was cut to $695 million. That makes the Clifton Corridor line the single largest project on the list.
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Strike for the suburbs, but win for intown.
I actually interpreted the cuts as a strike for mass transit and a win for roads.
The Clifton corridor plan as presented at the Kirkwood Neighbors’ Organization meeting was silly. Why is MARTA talking about tunneling under East Lake Road toward I-20 instead of tunneling under the CSX line to Clairmont, then going west to Emory?
If the East Lake tunnel, 35 feet underground, is safe to build, why isn’t it safe to go under the CSX tracks? The tunnel entrance is there — it’s the same one they want to use for East Lake.
That’s not the Clifton Corridor, that’s the proposed I-20 rail line.
Exactly. The Clifton Corridor is from Lindburgh to Avondale through the Emory Campus and has nothing to do with the I-20 project.
I don’t think the Clifton line comes anywhere near East lake Road. The option to run near East Lake was discarded. The route begins at Linderbergh Marta station. Runs mostly along or near existing rail lines to Sage Hill, CDC, Emory. After Emory the line becomes a bus route to the Avondale Stattion.
Looks like transit improvements are offered a fraction of their potential cost, while roads get big bucks. This is not progress.