Brooklyn Park Gives Municipal Consent To Blue Line Light Rail Extension

Brooklyn Park Gives Municipal Consent To Blue Line Light Rail Extension

The Brooklyn Park City Council gave the go-ahead on Monday, Sept. 23, for the design of the Bottineau Blue Line Light Rail Extension.

The rail line is planned to run from Target Field in downtown Minneapolis through Robbinsdale, Crystal and Brooklyn Park.

Five of the 12 stations along the 13.4 mile rail line are planned for construction in Brooklyn Park.

In a 5-1 vote, the council voted “yes” to municipal consent. Municipal consent is a process that gives cities in the light rail corridor an opportunity to weigh in on the line’s design and request changes to the blueprint.

Cities do not have the authority to stop construction of the rail line, however.

Mayor Hollies Winston said he wants to see the potential for new development near a rail line come to fruition.

“I think it’s important to make it safe, I think it’s important to make it work for us,” Winston said. “But I do not think that we should be looking as a city and saying we want to turn around — we want to turn away investment that we have paid to other people. When it becomes our turn, [our] time for that investment, we don’t want that investment?”

Brooklyn Park City Council members generally supported the design of the project.

However, several members said they want to see more east-west bus connections in the city.

Council Member Boyd Morson, who cast the lone dissenting vote, said he wanted to see new plans for buses before approving municipal consent.

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Likewise, Council Member Nichole Klonowski called the lack of east-west busing “reprehensible.”

She also spoke to concerns related to public safety costs connected to the line.

Crystal  and Robbinsdale pushed back their municipal consent votes to Oct. 1.

SOURCE: CCX MEDIA