MAX Green Line
The MAX Green Line is a light rail route in the MAX Light Rail system in Portland, Oregon, United States, extending to Clackamas, Oregon. Construction began in early 2007,[2] and the line opened on September 12, 2009.[3] The average daily ridership in June 2010 was 19,500[4] increasing to 24,300 by April 2012.[1]
Contents
Project details
The Green Line runs over a combination of existing and new tracks. New tracks were built in two projects:
- Portland Mall Revitalization Project: Added light rail tracks to the Portland Transit Mall on both Fifth and Sixth Avenues between Portland State University and Union Station, along with tracks connecting this section to previously existing tracks on the west deck of the Steel Bridge, a total length of 1.8 miles (2.9 km). The project was born of the need to relieve congestion on the existing downtown Portland MAX alignment on Yamhill and Morrison Streets. The new Portland Mall tracks first came on August 30, 2009, by the MAX Yellow Line,[5] but the Green Line opened for service just 13 days later and also runs on this new alignment,[2] traveling the 2 miles from PSU to Rose Quarter in 17 minutes.
- I-205 Light Rail Project: Constructed a new 6.5-mile (10.5 km) alignment between Gateway Transit Center and a new transit center at Clackamas Town Center. The majority of this alignment uses the grade-separated, previously-unfinished I-205 Transitway built at the time Interstate 205 was constructed, in the late 1970s and early 1980s.[6]
The alignment passes under the Burnside St., Stark St., Washington St., Main St. (pedestrian) and Market St. overpasses on the east side of the freeway, then crosses under the freeway between the Market St. and Division St. overpasses. It passes under the Division St. overpass before going over Powell Boulevard. and then under the Holgate Boulevard. overpass. It then passes under the Steele St. (ped.) overpass and over Harold St., Foster Rd., Woodstock Blvd., and Springwater corridor. The line then crosses Johnson Creek before an at-grade crossing at Flavel St. The line passes over the intersection of 92nd Avenue and Crystal Springs Boulevard, then returns to grade before traveling above Johnson Creek Boulevard on a 1,400-foot-long overpass, the longest new structure on the alignment. South of Fuller Road station the line dips under the pre-existing Otty Road and Monterey Avenue overpasses, before terminating at the Clackamas Town Center Transit Center, near Sunnyside Road. Because of the extensive grade-separation, trains are able to travel the 6.5-mile (10.5 km) distance from Clackamas to Gateway in only 16 minutes. Much of this segment parallels the I-205 Bike Path.
Connecting the two new sections is the following previously existing section:
- Banfield-Burnside Eastside MAX: Between the west end of the Steel Bridge, at the edge of downtown Portland, and the Gateway Transit Center, the Green Line uses a portion of the original MAX alignment, completed in 1986 and which is now part of the Blue Line. The Red Line has also used the same section since its opening, in 2001.
Finances
The MAX Green Line project cost $575.7 million, $345.4 million of which was funded by the Federal Transit Administration.[7] The project received $32 million in funding from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, an amount already committed to the project by the federal government but made available so that TriMet could retire debt earlier.[7]
Possible future extension
The line may one day be extended south to Oregon City.[8][9] Such an extension was one of six corridors in Metro's High Capacity Transit System Plan designated as a "Next Phase Regional Priority Corridor,"[10] a second-level tier where "future HCT investment may be viable if recommended planning and policy actions are implemented."
Stations
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References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 TriMet ridership continues to rise May 11, 2012. TriMet. Retrieved 2012-05-11.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
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- ↑ Monthly Performance Report (June 2010) (PDF). July 23, 2010. TriMet. Retrieved 2010-09-07.
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- ↑ http://trimet.org/pdfs/tip/tip.pdf (8.7M page vi)
- ↑ Regional High Capacity Transit System Plan 2035 - Summary Report. June 2010. Metro. http://library.oregonmetro.gov/files//hct_plan_june2010_web.pdf
External links
- MAX Green Line Project History (brief summary) on TriMet website.
