There was a special meeting of Peoria Heights’ Board of Trustees tonight. The topic? The Kellar Branch. They wanted to hear from Pioneer Railcorp and the Illinois Prairie Railroad Foundation (IPRRF) about the possibility of running a trolley on the embattled line.
Mike Carr, CEO of Pioneer, gave the main presentation to the board and Sharon Deckard, President of IPRRF, gave some additional info at the end. Then they both answered questions from the board and the audience. You can see a PDF copy (2MB file) of their PowerPoint presentation* by clicking here.
Heights Mayor Mark Allen explained that this was an informational meeting meant to help the Village Board make an informed decision about the future of the Kellar Branch. In two weeks, on March 28, there will be another special meeting where the Park District and trail advocates will be allowed to present their plan for a trail only going through the corridor and why they think that will be best for the Heights.
Carr and Deckard explained how trolleys had been successful in large and small cities and had in all cases led to economic development along the trolley rail’s corridor. In addition to the benefits of a tourist trolley, it was also emphasized that increased congestion, city expansion, and rising gas prices would lead to the demand for more public transportation options in the future, and having a rail corridor through town is an asset to preserve for future commuter use.
Judging from the reaction of the audience, which was heavily stacked with trail supporters, not many people believed the presentation. But hey, they all laughed at Christopher Columbus when he said the world was round, as Gershwin would say. Mayor Allen explained that a feasibility study would have to be done before a final decision was made. But now’s the time to do it — before the tracks are torn up — because once they’re gone, they’re gone forever.
Well, technically, the land lease with the Park District allows the proposed trail to be reconverted back to rail use at any point in the future, but the costs of relaying the tracks and reimbursing the Park District for construction of the trail would be so astronomical as to make that option completely unfeasible.
After the meeting, I went to Peoria Pizza Works with Sharon Deckard, Gary Sandberg, David Jordan, a couple other railfans, and — are you ready for this? — Christine Smith of the Journal Star Editorial Board and her date. It was actually quite fun to get to talk to her, since I regularly lambaste the editorial page of Peoria’s newspaper of record.
You know what? I like her. Even though we don’t agree, and probably never will, about the Kellar Branch, she was very personable and likes to play devil’s advocate, which is one of my favorite pasttimes. I found out that she and Bailey (the senior editor of the PJS) both read my blog, which was flattering, although one could make the argument that they just do that as part of their job. Fair enough. It’s still nice to be read. 🙂
Since Shelley Epstein retired, there have been only two editors — Smith and Bailey. I joked that if one more editor left, we’d all know who was writing the unsigned editorials. I found out that Bailey edits Smith’s editorials, so that’s why they all sound like Bailey’s voice to some degree. I also found out that Smith wrote the “Bradley is not the bogeyman” editorial. We talked a little about that… but I digress.
Smith thinks the trolley idea is completely crazy. She doesn’t think it will get any ridership — that no one is going to be interested in riding a trolley… at least, not enough people to make it profitable. But she did admit that it’s worth doing a feasibility study on it; she just thinks it will vindicate her belief that it’s totally nuts. I say, bring it on.
*Full disclosure: I created the slides for the PowerPoint presentation. And yes, Pioneer will be paying me for my work in creating those slides. This is the first time I’ve done any work for them or received any payment of monetary or non-monetary value.
There have been several instances lately that I have had a sense of deja-vu when reading the main PJS editorial. Today is a good example – thought I was reading CJ’s article about his alternative ideas for the BU expansion.
Very flattering to you and your work, C.J. – just wish the PJSEB would give you some of the credit!
Companies farm out designing powerpoint presentations?
Does this occur a lot?
Do the JS editors think Peoria is that out of step with the rest of the world, being as trolleys/light rail are succeeding everywhere else?
C. J.,
It was pretty amazing sitting at a table with Gary Sandberg and Christine Smith, especially since I was seated between them. We all had a good conversation, though.
PrairieCelt: During our discussion about Bradley and the Uplands, I told her my idea about switching the sites of the recreational center and the parking garage. She said I should read Tuesday’s editorial and gave me a little bit of a preview. I asked her if she read my “humble suggestion” blog entry and she said she hadn’t, but she was going to look it up either last night or today. She did say (I’m paraphrasing here): “I bet Bailey saw it. He reads the blogs all the time.”
It was a good editorial today. If my little blog had any part in influencing it (and I’m not saying that it did), then I’m honored.
Is Christine Smith so backwards that she has no idea of what is going on outside of Central Illinois? Has she ever heard of Kenosha? Is she aware that a city called “Memphis” exists? Does the Editorial Board find that they do not have to do any investigation of any type to back up their “beliefs”? Because there is no trolley in Central Illinois right now, that means there should never be one? Because no one rides on a non-existent trolley, that means no one will ever ride one? Did she just come down from the hills surrounding Creve Coeur?
Memo to Christine Smith- wake up. The world is passing you by.
Memo to Christine Smith and the rest of the trail nazis:
Quit telling everyone a trolley or other such things won’t work. Why do you care if it works or not? It isn’t tax money being spent to do it. If it fails, it fails but at least it won’t be sucking millions of tax dollars in the meantime, like the trail will.
I mentioned that to Christine — the way I explained it was that the trolley would be an amenity just like the trail. The difference is, the trolley would be a privately-funded amenity; the trail would be a publicly-funded amenity.
We also talked about the park district setting arbitrary conditions on this trail connection. Why does it have to be a “Class I” trail? Why can’t it go onto lightly traveled residential streets (like Harvard Ave. or Glen Elm Dr.) in places?
The park district will say that their grant money doesn’t cover that. Well, guess what? They’ve renegotiated what that grant money covers once already. They kept the same amount of funding, but reduced the section length they wanted to convert. So, why can’t they renegotiate it again? Especially with the help of Ray LaHood, Aaron Schock, et. al., wouldn’t they have an easier time securing the funds for a compromise like that instead of trying to influence the STB to abandon their mission and become trail advocates? Even if they couldn’t renegotiate it, there are other grants available — in fact, the Park District has gotten liberal IDNR grants to complete other portions of the trail. I’m sure they can secure the money if they really put their minds to it — if they were really committed to finding a win-win in this situation.
Christine is entitled to her opinion. I might have agreed with her six months ago before I started looking at the cities that have tried trolley service. I’ve been amazed by the success those cities have seen. If we had to spend the millions of dollars to acquire property and build a new rail line, I’d say forget it — it will never be feasible. But the rail line is already in place and corridor is already secured. The most expensive part is done and just waiting to be fixed up a little and used.
Like I said, let’s do a feasibility study. Let’s look at economic development potential with freight and trolley service on a rail line versus economic development potential with a trail only. I can absolutely guarantee you that “trail-only” is not going to win that contest. Bring it on.
What was that meeting like last night, C.J.? Were the people rowdy or under control? Who or what kept it under control, assuming it might have been?
You should’ve suggested they sign the editorials Bailey/Smith, ala Lennon/McCartney- then everyone could waste the next 30 years trying to figure out which part was written by Bailey and which part was written by Smith… and then they couldn’t be criticized for being “unsigned”.
You sounded surprised that she was a nice person, as if you were expecting her to be some kind of ogre.
Feasibility Study? I’m with you- bring it on!
Last night’s meeting was fairly well organized. The Mayor clearly defined what the purpose of the meeting was and that was to gather information regarding the trolley project. He stated that the meeting on March 28th will be to gather information from the Park District and the trail advocates. Most people in the audience were civil and stated their questions well and we responded. There were those that were closed minded and you couldn’t show them two sides of the issue if you had a search light going on in the room. But we expected that and got on with the program. Each of us has our own opinion and has a right to it and as long as it is expressed in a mannerly fashion there is no problem. Last night’s audience were well behaved. We look forward to attending the meeting on March 20th to see the other side of the story.
Mahkno said, “Companies farm out designing powerpoint presentations? Does this occur a lot?”
Yes to your first question. As for your second question, I have no idea what the frequency is.
Sassafrass said, “What was that meeting like last night, C.J.? Were the people rowdy or under control? Who or what kept it under control, assuming it might have been?”
It was very low-key and under control. Most questions were on-point and respectful. What kept it under control was a very good setup by the mayor of Peoria Heights. He did a superb job of explaining what we would and would not be discussing, what questions are allowed and which are off limits, etc. That made the difference.
PI said, “You sounded surprised that she was a nice person, as if you were expecting her to be some kind of ogre.”
I didn’t know what to expect, and was pleasantly surprised. In contrast, I didn’t know what to expect when I met Gary Anna of Bradley, either, but I didn’t like him. I had bad vibes about him immediately.