Now that Congress is on track to appropriate $9.8 million for a Wasatch Front light-rail transit system in the coming year and Transportation Secretary Federico Pena has agreed to include hundreds of millions more in next year's budget, people are moving on from concerns over whether the trains are coming and starting to worrying about details.
Details are where the devil is, according to a well-known aphorism. True to form, some of the details already are causing trouble - such as the one concerning where the initial tracks will roll through downtown Salt Lake City.Two years ago, the City Council voted to bring two sets of tracks onto Main Street from 700 South - one set leading into town and the other out - with a stub leading to the Delta Center.
Not all downtown interests were happy with that one, although the merchants and the malls were. Nothing works quite like a train that brings shoppers to your doorstep. But larger concerns, such as Sinclair Oil, First Security Bank and Utah Power, wanted the tracks on State instead, part of a loop that would cut over to West Temple and bypass Main entirely. Some went as far as to grumble that they wouldn't support light rail if they didn't get their way.
Bringing all these interests together and agreeing on a route would be harder than herding a flock of birds, but the Downtown Alliance - a group comprising virtually all vital interests in the central business core - gave it a gallant try.
After months of study, the group hammered out a consensus it presented to the City Council last week. The consensus would bring the tracks in on Main and loop them around South Temple and onto West Temple, eliminating the Delta Center connection.
My dictionary defines consensus as an opinion held by all or most in a group. By that definition, I suppose the plan qualified.
Unfortunately for the alliance, however, the City Council saw it less as an airtight agreement and more as a leaky life boat whose occupants had agreed to stick their fingers in the holes rather than sink.
Before the meeting, the Downtown Retail Merchants Association - a group that primarily represents retailers - sent a letter saying they had participated in the alliance's study and, yes, they had voted for the consensus, but they really would rather have the tracks on Main only.
Meanwhile, participants said a First Security Bank representative had voted against the consensus proposal. That was significant because bank officials had been quoted as saying even a single track on Main would be unacceptable.
And the City Council wasn't sure whether the veiled threats from some business owners to oppose light rail if they didn't get their way were valid. Politicians want to avoid the appearance of giving in to intimidation. Not surprisingly, they voted to reject the consensus out of hand.
It was a prudent decision. A lot of technical reasons exist for putting two sets of tracks on Main Street. Construction would be less disruptive and the trains, once in place, would be more convenient for commuters. Even the Alliance's own study, conducted by the transportation consultants Fehr & Peers Associates, found that light-rail ridership might decrease by 20 percent if the tracks deviated from Main. Meanwhile, the consensus proposal was estimated to cost $14 million more.
The alliance did present some compelling arguments, however. Clyde Heiner, senior vice president for Questar and head of the alliance's transportation committee, said the West Temple loop still would serve the Delta Center (most fans can walk two blocks). It would run past the convention center and would be more enticing to tourists, a group that so far has been virtually ignored by light-rail planners (the system is seen as primarily benefiting commuters).
But these weren't enough to persuade the city, which now is moving on to other decisions, such as whether to move all UTA buses off of Main. Things could, after all, get crowded on that street. If the tracks come, Main would be host to an estimated 128 trains and 661 buses per day by 2010.
Either way, the system eventually would have more spurs than a country music festival, connecting riders to the University of Utah and the airport.
Of course, it all would be moot if someone influential persuaded Congress to reverse its course and yank federal funding next year. But one detail at a time, please.