Perhaps you've heard of the
Connector, the $2.5 million-dollar study several Ann Arbor institutions are conducting to create a high-capacity transit route from northeast to south Ann Arbor.
But if not, don't feel too bad about having missed the boat.
Although the study has been in the works for
over six years, it still hasn't been placed in front of the public eye.
"I don't think the public knows very much about it at this point, and that makes a lot of sense," says Chris White, manager of service development for the Ann Arbor Area Transit Authority (AAATA). "While we've done a certain amount of public outreach, it's so far in the future that most people aren't going to go to a meeting or read information about it."
The basic idea for the Connector project originated with former Ann Arbor mayor John Hieftje's 2006
Model For Mobility. The key partners in the project–AAATA, the University of Michigan, the city of Ann Arbor and the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority (DDA)–collectively funded a
$640,000 study in 2010 that declared such a project feasible. In 2012 the four agencies came up with another $300,000 to supplement a $1.2 million federal grant for an "alternatives analysis" study. The goal of the study, which is still ongoing, is to determine the best route and mode of transportation for the project.
But since 2013 news of the project has largely petered out, with the exception of a "
project update" released this February. DDA board member Roger Hewitt, the DDA's representative on the Connector committee, admits that "for actually nearly a year we really haven't done very much." Connector committee members have differing explanations for the holdup. City transportation manager Eli Cooper, the city's representative on the Connector committee, says the project is currently on a "summer vacation schedule" and that residents should expect new information on the Connector this fall.
"If you do something that is at a point when someone is not around, they immediately have a suspicion that you're trying to hide something or trying to get it through when no one's looking," Cooper says. "We want just the opposite. We want as a project committee to maximize the public engagement in the project."
However, Hewitt says the turnover from former U-M president Mary Sue Coleman to new president Mark Schlissel has left the university in a "lengthy examination period about their commitment to the project." U-M is generally seen as the main beneficiary of the Connector, which would link North and South Campus. The university contributed the lion's share of funding–$150,000–to the alternatives analysis study.
"We're really at the point now where if we're going to continue with the process…they have to decide whether -if the project does go forward- they are going to make a major financial contribution to help fund it," Hewitt says.
U-M planner Susan Gott, the university's representative for the Connector project, declined an interview for this story. Concentrate contacted the university's public affairs team but no sources at U-M were available for comment at publication time.
Obstacles
Even if the Connector does move forward from the alternatives analysis phase, there are still plenty of hurdles to clear.
"Often transit projects have multiple municipalities or multiple political jurisdictions that you're trying to coordinate and this one doesn't," says Elisabeth Gerber, the Jack L. Walker, Jr. professor of public policy at U-M. "That's in its favor. But it's complex and it's expensive."
One of the most complex elements is determining exactly what route the Connector will take. The basic idea is that it will follow a loose
boomerang shape, notably running through the high-congestion Plymouth Road corridor on its way from the Domino Farms area through U-M and downtown Ann Arbor to the Briarwood Mall area. The Connector committee presented
six proposed routes in 2013 as part of the alternatives analysis study, but White says there are challenges associated with establishing each of them.
"There's a new bus rapid transit project in
Grand Rapids on Division Street, and the advantage was they had the street they were using as the right of way," he says. "We don't have that, as in some places we cut across…the river and the railroad tracks."
If a feasible route can be established, funding the actual construction of the Connector will present another obvious major challenge. Hewitt says the committee would likely seek federal funding to cover half the cost of construction, but the remainder would have to come from some publicly approved funding. Cooper says it's difficult to say how Ann Arborites would respond to such a proposal, but offers the 70-percent approval of last year's
AAATA millage as a positive sign.
Cooper hastens to note that the Connector would not be a "magic wand" to erase congestion on Plymouth or Fuller Roads. But he says the dedicated high-capacity transportation system would present an inherently speedier alternative for many "
riders of choice" who currently see no point boarding a bus to sit in the same traffic they'd encounter in their cars.
"For the folks that either have no choice or choose to drive, it'd be clear to them that they do have choices, whereas today the choices are somewhat equal," Cooper says.
What about Washtenaw?
Of course, while the Connector would add commuter options and ease traffic issues in some key areas of town, it still leaves other major pinch points untouched.
"It's clearly only one piece," White says. "For the city itself, I think it works to make significant improvements on a couple corridors but it doesn't solve anything with a couple of other corridors, particularly Washtenaw and Jackson Road."
While some solutions have already been implemented on Washtenaw, they're still just the start of easing what is arguably Ann Arbor's biggest rush-hour headache. White notes that AAATA doubled its service along the corridor in 2012.
"There's twice as many buses and yet the demand of the ridership has grown enough that we still have lots of crowded buses on that route," he says.
ReImagine Washtenaw presented several mass transit-related solutions for Washtenaw in its
Corridor Improvement Study last year. The group's recommendations included transit signal priority for buses, allowing them to shorten red lights or extend green lights; larger bus stops with pull-off lanes; and bus-only lanes. AAATA board member and Ypsilanti-based transit activist Gillian Ream Gainsley expresses particular support for that last recommendation, noting that Michigan has been slow to adopt high-occupancy vehicle lanes. The
first HOV lane in the state's history was introduced in Detroit in 2008.
"That's something I'd like to see us push for, both the public and as organizations," Gainsley says. "As we get more and more congested it really is a more and more important tool for us to start using."
However, White says HOV lanes on Washtenaw are a possibility only in the long term, once traffic has already been significantly reduced by other means, if at all.
"The issue with that kind of corridor is that you can't take away existing travel lanes in order to do that," he says. "You just can't, if nothing else, get public support for that kind of effort."
Cooper floats an even longer-term possibility for solving Washtenaw's woes: "complementing" the current Connector study with a similar high-capacity transit system on Washtenaw. But Ann Arborites will have to wait and see if one Connector, let alone two, can come to fruition in the first place.
Patrick Dunn is an Ann Arbor-based freelance writer and a senior writer at Concentrate. He will be reporting on local transportation issues over the next year.
All photos by Doug Coombe .
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