Form a line, please

Star Tribune Sun, 11 May 2008 03:31:02 GMT
Fridley tries to jump to the head of line for transit sales tax funds

The city's proposed Northstar commuter rail station missed out on $10 million in federal money. Fridley officials are hoping the new quarter-cent transit sales tax will be a lifeline for the city's proposed station on the Northstar commuter rail line. This week, contractors will begin preparing the Fridley site for construction, which is scheduled to begin this month, even though the $10 million needed to build the station was left out of the state bonding bill this legislative session. In the meantime, Fridley officials are urging Anoka County commissioners to put the station high on the list of projects competing for money from the sales tax. The Northstar line is set to open in late 2009, but the Fridley station was left out of federal funding for the project. "We're going to be very eager to try to get some of the county's quarter-cent sales tax money for our site," said Fridley City Manager Bill Burns. "We think we should have a legitimate claim to some funding in the near future." But Fridley will face tough competition from the other transit-related projects in the metro area to get some of the $100 million the tax is expected to raise by 2009.

[[keywords: PublicWorks;Metro;]]