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City uses grant to improve trolley service

City uses grant to improve trolley service

Milwaukee has improved its trolley services by purchasing 10 trolleys and modifying service routes. The $4.5 million project is a three-year pilot program
  • Written by Terra Hargett
  • 1st December 2000

Milwaukee has improved its trolley services by purchasing 10 trolleys and modifying service routes. The $4.5 million project is a three-year pilot program established by the Milwaukee County Transit System (MCTS) to reduce traffic congestion and pollution.

In 1999, MCTS owned three diesel-powered trolleys, which ran on a limited, circular route. The trolleys were used primarily as sight-seeing buses for tourists. Residents, local businesses and the Convention and Visitors Bureau (CVB) expressed interest in running the trolleys more frequently.

The MCTS applied for a congestion mitigation air quality grant from the state of Wisconsin to fund the trolley expansion. The agency also applied for a CMAQ capital equipment grant to purchase 10 additional trolleys. The MCTS worked with key groups, such as the CVB, the Business Improvement District and downtown neighborhood associations to plan trolley services and marketing strategies.

In February 2000, the MCTS received the $2 million state grant to fund operations expenses for a three-year trial expansion. After receiving an additional $2.5 million equipment grant, the agency ordered the trolleys.

The new service runs on two linear routes and decreases the pickup time from 20 to 10 minutes. The river route follows the Milwaukee River, carrying passengers from downtown to Milwaukee’s refurbished Water Street and Third Ward districts. The lake route runs down Wisconsin Ave., Milwaukee’s main street. Both routes operate Monday through Thursday from 9 a.m. to 10 p.m. and on weekends until 1 a.m.

Since the expanded service began in June 2000, residents and visitors have supported the trolleys, says Joe Caruso, marketing and communications manager for MCTS. During the summer, an average of 1,500 people rode the trolleys each day. Since implementing a less-extensive, non-summer service after Labor Day, the serv-ice has had 1,000 to 1,200 riders each day.

The trolley service receives funding from passenger fees and from an existing property tax to supplement the operations grant. Although the agency has not secured additional funding, the MCTS hopes to fund the trolley services with passenger fees after the three-year trial period.

– History repeating. In the “Afterword” to his 1976 book, “1876,” Gore Vidal wrote, “The year 1876 was probably the low point in our republic’s history, and knowing something about what happened then is, I think, useful to us now as times are again becoming rather too interesting for comfort.” “1876” is, of course, about the presidential race between Samuel Tilden and Rutherford B. Hayes. In that race, Tilden won the popular vote and Hayes the electoral vote.

– Put that on the calendar. Residents of Claysville, Pa., celebrated the return of the chicken-flying contest to the East Finley Summer Festival in July after its 10-year absence. To compete, contestants put chickens in mailboxes and use toilet plungers to open the boxes abruptly, unleashing the chickens, which then fly hundreds of feet, according to the Washington, Pa., Observer-Reporter. The chicken that flies the farthest wins. Festival sponsors say that the chicken-flying contest is much more exciting than its hiatus stand-in: cow patty bingo.

– Usually you have to pull off and pay $5 at the Gator Ranch to see that. A refrigerated trailer carrying 26 alligator carcasses overturned on I-595 near Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., spilling its bounty onto the highway. According to Reuters, state troopers closed one lane of traffic to help with the cleanup, while traffic sped by.

– Entering and breaking? Paralyzed inmate Torrance Johnson filed a lawsuit against the Spartanburg County (S.C.) Jail because guards failed to stop him when he was doing backflips off a desk in his cell. Yup, he landed on his neck.

– The benefits of life after death. Disabled Springfield, Mass., police officer Charles Peck has asked the city council for higher benefits than those offered after the 1982 squad car crash that ended his career. The officer wants benefits equal to his full salary, which are available only to surviving spouses of deceased officers. Peck claims that he is his own survivor, having been pronounced dead at the scene of the accident and only resuscitated later at the hospital

– That’s, like, totally wicked, man. A 19-year-old man in Albuquerque was charged with DUI after he drove through two traffic barriers off the end of an inactive, demolished overpass and dropped 20 feet. He then said to an approaching police officer, “Hey, dude, you’re not calling the cops, are you?”

– Not quick enough. Keith Quick, 28, was hospitalized in July after being trapped in an Omaha, Neb., garbage truck where he was compacted along with several loads of trash. According to Reuters, it took firefighters an hour to dig the man out from the tightly compressed refuse. Quick had been sleeping in a local dumpster when the city trash truck came by. It was not until several loads of trash later that the truck driver heard Quick calling for help. By that time he had been compacted two or three times.

– Usually you have to pull off and pay $5 at the Gator Ranch to see that. A refrigerated trailer carrying 26 alligator carcasses overturned on I-595 near Fort Lauderdale, Fla., spilling its bounty onto the highway. According to Reuters, state troopers closed one lane of traffic to help with the cleanup, while traffic in the other lanes sped blithely by.

– Anytown, USA. According to Iowa’s elections board, the total vote for Al Gore in Cedar County was 4,025. The total for George W. Bush: 4,025.

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