“The tram has no impact on the actual access to the airport, but it does impact how passengers and employees actually get to the airport,” Rief told a MAC committee last week.
About 35 million passengers use the airport each year, with about 68% starting or ending their journey there. The MAC estimates that 60,000 vehicles carry passengers, visitors and staff to and from the airport every day, but said no updated traffic study has been conducted since the pandemic.
Rief also said that introducing a streetcar along 34th Avenue S. on the way to Terminal 2 would cause “unbearable delays” because a Blue Line train or streetcar would run down the avenue every five minutes during peak hours. This comes as the MAC plans to expand the smaller terminal.
In contrast, the bus rapid transit service would only drop off passengers at Terminal 1 in the Silver Ramp. Passengers wanting to go to Terminal 2, a Sun Country Airlines hub, would have to take the existing light rail to get to the smaller terminal, which is what the current local bus service does. In the future, the MAC could build a people mover between the two terminals.
Some MAC commissioners seemed fixated on the cost of the streetcar proposal last week, even though the MAC is not funding the project. The bulk of the funding would come from the federal government and Ramsey and Hennepin counties.
Commissioner Don Monaco said the cost-benefit analysis made no sense for the tram. “If this was a business, I would say, ‘Why are we considering something we can’t afford?'”
