OKC Regional Transit System

[shawnw]

thank you very much for keeping us in the loop

[HangryHippo]

Important Update...Edmond City Council became the first city to approve the RTA trust indenture on Monday evening. Norman City Council votes next.

When is the Norman vote?

[Plutonic Panda]

Important Update...Edmond City Council became the first city to approve the RTA trust indenture on Monday evening. Norman City Council votes next.

Hutch, you seem to really be in the know about all of this. Does Edmond seem like they're ready to pull the trigger when it comes to funding the necessary improvements needed for an Edmond stop? Edmond will likely require the most funding for their transit station. Midwest City has not much of a downtown area so theirs will likely be a bit cheaper, I'd guess. Coupled with Edmond positioning itself to be the "premier" suburb, I'm sure they will spend a bit more to have a nicer station. I know they have already stated the need for a multimodal transit hub, I can't remember if the last capital projects package includes any funding to that or not. For some reason I think it does.

[Hutch]

When is the Norman vote?

Norman votes at the next City Council meeting at 6:30 pm on Tuesday, October 23rd. If you're a Norman resident and transit supporter, I encourage you to show up and offer support.

[baralheia]

Norman votes at the next City Council meeting at 6:30 pm on Tuesday, October 23rd. If you're a Norman resident and transit supporter, I encourage you to show up and offer support.

Fantastic news that Edmond has approved the RTA! When is OKC expected to vote on the trust indenture?

[Hutch]

Hutch, you seem to really be in the know about all of this. Does Edmond seem like they're ready to pull the trigger when it comes to funding the necessary improvements needed for an Edmond stop? Edmond will likely require the most funding for their transit station. Midwest City has not much of a downtown area so theirs will likely be a bit cheaper, I'd guess. Coupled with Edmond positioning itself to be the "premier" suburb, I'm sure they will spend a bit more to have a nicer station. I know they have already stated the need for a multimodal transit hub, I can't remember if the last capital projects package includes any funding to that or not. For some reason I think it does.

The current thinking is that once the RTA is created and funded...emphasis on funded...it will develop a standardized station design and be responsible for construction of all stations based on the cost of the standardized station. If a city wants to customize the design or provide additional amenities, that city will be responsible for the additional costs. For example, if Norman had a stop at the Duck Pond and wanted the station to have an OU theme, then Norman would need to pay for the upgrades. As for Edmond, their enthusiasm for being part of a regional transit system has grown considerably since we first started working on all of this. They already have the transit station downtown on the north side of 2nd. It looks like there's multiple possibilities to add an adjoining rail station. I don't know if they've already allocated funding for it, but my guess is when its time to start construction, they'll want to contribute additional funding to make their station special and unique.

[BG918]

Norman votes at the next City Council meeting at 6:30 pm on Tuesday, October 23rd. If you're a Norman resident and transit supporter, I encourage you to show up and offer support.

Norman is critical for getting this to work so I hope it passes

[Hutch]

Fantastic news that Edmond has approved the RTA! When is OKC expected to vote on the trust indenture?

It looks like OKC will vote last...probably the third week of November...so by that point, we'll hopefully have Edmond, Norman, Moore, Midwest City and Del City on board...no pun intended...and OKC can have the honor of giving final approval and creating the RTA...the goal is to get all participating cities to approve the indenture before Thanskgiving.

[Hutch]

Norman is critical for getting this to work so I hope it passes

The participating cities have worked hard on this for more than ten years...Norman has always been at the front of the pack...I know they're supportive and confident it will be approved.

[Hutch]

Norman Transcript Op-Ed: Norman, surrounding communities at regional transit crossroads

[Pryor Tiger]

Is Yukon or Mustang involved in this conversation at all, or even the Will Rogers Airport included in where it could possibly come in from Mustang through the airport, Yukon down I40, then both lines could connect to make the rest of the trek downtown?

[HangryHippo]

Is Yukon or Mustang involved in this conversation at all, or even the Will Rogers Airport included in where it could possibly come in from Mustang through the airport, Yukon down I40, then both lines could connect to make the rest of the trek downtown?

I’m curious about Yukon as well.

[catch22]

Hutch can correct me if this is wrong but I believe both Yukon and Mustang were invited but did not want to be a part of it.

[baralheia]

Is Yukon or Mustang involved in this conversation at all, or even the Will Rogers Airport included in where it could possibly come in from Mustang through the airport, Yukon down I40, then both lines could connect to make the rest of the trek downtown?

To the best of my knowledge (and Hutch, please correct me if I'm wrong) but it's my understanding that Yukon and Mustang declined to be part of the conversation for now, since the current gameplan doesn't yet include them. I don't see any reason why they couldn't join the RTA at a later date when they deem it necessary, though. Will Rogers is included by way of the City of OKC. As of the September task force agenda posted on ACOG's website, the entities involved right now are the cities of Del City, Edmond, Midwest City, Moore, Norman, and OKC; also involved are representatives from COPTA, CART, Citylink-Edmond, Greater OKC Chamber, Norman Chamber, and OnTrac. Only the city representatives are actually voting members, however.

You can read more about the RTA task force on ACOG's website here: http://www.acogok.org/transportation...ty-task-force/

[Hutch]

The RTA effort has been going on for nearly a decade. In the beginning and throughout much of the Regional Transit Dialogue discussions, Yukon and Mustang chose not to participate. That may have had to do with the fact that the basis for those early discussions was the 2005 Fixed Guideway Study, which did not recommend commuter rail to those areas as part of the initial system. As the RTD discussions evolved into the RTA Task Force, it was decided that the original participating cities would be the founding members of the RTA, and that Yukon, Mustang or other municipalities could then join when they were ready.

Yukon, Mustang, Will Rogers and the Fairgrounds can all be effectively served by commuter rail and connected to Santa Fe Station. The UP lines runs through west OKC to Yukon and the Stillwater Central lines runs past the airport to Mustang. While the FGS did not provide for rail service to those areas in 2005, the OKC metro continues to grow to the west, and it's likely those areas will qualify for rail transit service in the near future.

[Hutch]

We recently updated the OnTrac website. The homepage has a chronological listing of links to local news stories concerning local transit efforts over the last ten years. There’s also a revised OnTrac rail transit presentation link with good background information. If you’re new to the issue or just want a refresher on how we got here, please visit our site:

OnTrac

Note: Our server is sometimes slow to load

[Hutch]

Important Update...Edmond City Council became the first city to approve the RTA trust indenture on Monday evening. Norman City Council votes next.

Norman City Council just voted unanimously to approve the RTA trust indenture.

[HangryHippo]

Norman City Council just voted unanimously to approve the RTA trust indenture.

Awesome news!

[duluoz139]

Interesting read.....
https://www.orlandosentinel.com/news...009-story.html
Having lived in East Orlando, nowhere near traditional rail, the system there is a disappointment. I'm hoping for a hybrid system here eventually that serves the entire city and not just a couple of rail corridors. Seems like we have a good start with the streetcar and I'm really hoping it is successful.

[baralheia]

Interesting read.....
https://www.orlandosentinel.com/news...009-story.html
Having lived in East Orlando, nowhere near traditional rail, the system there is a disappointment. I'm hoping for a hybrid system here eventually that serves the entire city and not just a couple of rail corridors. Seems like we have a good start with the streetcar and I'm really hoping it is successful.

While we will have areas of OKC that will not be near traditional rail, a *lot* of thought has gone into the planning process for our proposed system, and we are less likely to experience the issues that the Orlando system has encountered. Luckily, the BNSF corridor from Edmond to Norman punches through some of the most densely populated areas of the greater OKC Metro area, and two of the largest colleges in Oklahoma are at opposite ends of the line (#1 OU in Norman, #4 UCO in Edmond). The weakest point in our commuter rail plan as currently envisioned is that there is zero service currently planned to the airport, when it would be relatively simple to do so due to the proximity of the Stillwater Central line that goes down toward Chickasha and Lawton. I think it will be at least mildly successful without the airport connection, but adding airport connectivity would make success of the system much much more likely.

[PaddyShack]

Once we get the connections lined up and rail in place, is the RTA going to be the operator of the actual passenger service or will a private operator be selected to run the service?

[jonny d]

While we will have areas of OKC that will not be near traditional rail, a *lot* of thought has gone into the planning process for our proposed system, and we are less likely to experience the issues that the Orlando system has encountered. Luckily, the BNSF corridor from Edmond to Norman punches through some of the most densely populated areas of the greater OKC Metro area, and two of the largest colleges in Oklahoma are at opposite ends of the line (#1 OU in Norman, #4 UCO in Edmond). The weakest point in our commuter rail plan as currently envisioned is that there is zero service currently planned to the airport, when it would be relatively simple to do so due to the proximity of the Stillwater Central line that goes down toward Chickasha and Lawton. I think it will be at least mildly successful without the airport connection, but adding airport connectivity would make success of the system much much more likely.

Are there ANY plans to extend to the airport? Or is that too pie in the sky for OKC?

[shawnw]

No current plans but once the RTA is in place they could change that fairly quickly (in the context of the speed of transit projects)

[baralheia]

Are there ANY plans to extend to the airport? Or is that too pie in the sky for OKC?

No plans just yet; most of the current planning has been done based on the results of the 2005 Fixed Guideway Study, which identified a northern, southern, and eastern corridor as being the most likely rail routes to succeed. A streetcar route to the airport was considered but at the time a Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) mode was deemed as the preferred transit technology. Then in 2014, the Central OK!GO study was completed, using feedback from the public, but this study only focused on the previously identified rail routes. http://www.acogok.org/transportation...ional-transit/ contains a lot of information about the transit planning that's been done to date. Of particular interest is the Central OK!GO study summary, which summarizes the most recent planning effort. Pages 21-24 explain in detail the currently planned routes, proposed station locations, and why these routes were selected.

[Hutch]

RTA Update

OKC City Council and the COTPA Board will hold a joint study session on Tuesday, November 13th to learn more about the RTA Trust Indenture prior to the document being formally considered for approval by Council the following week. ACOG staff and RTA Legal Consultant Kathryn Holmes will present information and answer questions in regard to the RTA. The study session will be held at the Cox Convention Center and is open to the public. See the agenda below.