City officials arranged the last of special Albuquerque Rapid Transit (ART) public meetings at the Kiva Auditorium Tuesday evening to let people ask questions and voice opinions about the project, set to start in a few months.
Participants had the opportunity to meet with ART project contractor Bradbury Stamm along with some of the managers associated with the project, while the ART team obtained input from residents and property owners in the area on how ABQ RIDE can mitigate project construction issues, according to a statement issued by city officials.
Dayna Crawford, deputy director and project manager for ART, said the project was recently included in the president’s budget, where the $70 million in federal funding was requested and later approved.
“The construction is planned to start late spring or early summer. It is a 10-mile construction from Louisiana to Coors,” she said.
She said that city officials have been doing public outreach since May 2011.
“We arranged 26 public meetings and this is the last one. Everyone can just come in and make comments or ask questions. We expect a big group tonight but I am not sure we are going to achieve that,” she said.
While the public outreach program began four years ago, lately the meetings have gotten more substantial.
“I felt like [people] haven’t heard about the project, but we did start in 2011. So a lot of people did. We contacted 6,600 people over the course of the outreach program,” she said.
Crawford said ART actually began in 2002, when the City Council expressed a desire for a major federal transit renovation along the corridor, and that is when the officials started doing research and development.
She said a lot of research was done on the capabilities and possible benefits of ART, and the team concluded that the project will produce 5,000 new jobs and $950 million worth of development beyond its completion.
“One organization thought that if we work on this project and improve our zoning we can see as much $2 billion worth of economic development,” Crawford said.
Ema Dantoni, a resident of Albuquerque who attended the meeting, said although she did not know too much about the project, she thought it was a good thing for the city.
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“I think it is a good start and I hope it can be extended to other parts of the town like North-South as well,” she said.
Aryon Hopkins, said he attended the meeting to advocate for the ART project because the city’s public transportation system is lagging behind other major cities.
Hopkins expressed that he is from Philadelphia, and that he used its public transit system every day.
“Here it is a bit harder. I just live by the river in the South Valley and I know that a dedicated plan like this will help me get into the city and more specifically out to the South Valley. I have different interests because I want people to visit the other side of the river as well,” he said.
Steve Schroeder, who owns a business in the Nob Hill area, said he opposes the ART project. He sat at the entrance of the Kiva Auditorium distributing pamphlets that explained why the ART project was disastrous for Albuquerque.
Schroeder said the plan to remove half of the traffic lanes for ART means half of the businessess in the area will shut down as a result.
“Let me give you an example of water. Water moves until it faces resistance, so does traffic. When traffic runs into congestion and runs into problems, it goes somewhere else. It harms businesses. When the businesses start going down, we lose tax revenues, which we really need for police officers, not buses,” Schroeder said.
He said new investors would not put money into a place where businesses are closing down as a result of the project.
“There are so many economic issues. Albuquerque is a nice place for tourists because there is no traffic. People can come and see balloons and go downtown. Why would you want to come to a place that you can’t even drive on. Also Route 66 is historic road and needs to be protected,” Schroeder said.
According to a press release Michael Riordan, chief operations officer for the City of Albuquerque, acknowledged that during the past meetings it has come across loud and clear that many people still have questions and feel their concerns have not been heard.
“While some individuals who like the project don’t feel comfortable voicing their opinions during the current public meeting process. That is why we decided to have this special meeting,” Riordan was quoted as saying in the statement.
Sayyed Shah is the assistant news editor at the Daily Lobo. He can be contacted at assistant-news@dailylobo.com or on Twitter @mianfawadshah.
