Loveland City Council unanimously voted against pursuing the RTA further Tuesday night.

I guess if the whole point of the thing was to get Greeley and Fort Collins to pay for the Centerra improvements there was no need to continue the charade any longer…

Greeley City Council wants to hear from the public on a proposed sales tax that would be used to fund Greeley roads.

This is basically an alternative to RTA plan rejected recently by the council. The intention is to spend the money directly on Greeley road construction and maintenance needs.

The road maintenance sales tax is proposed as a .54% tax increase (54 cents on a $100.00 taxable purchase) and the transit sales tax is proposed as a .25% increase (25 cents on a $100.00 taxable purchase). These proposed tax questions could be placed separately or combined on the ballot. Options to include concrete repair and potentially other ideas brought forward in the public hearing will be considered by Council members.

This is the first of two public hearings on the proposed sales tax.

The meeting is to be held tonight, Tuesday, August 7 at 6:30 p.m. at the Council Chambers at the old Public Safety Building located at 919 7th Street, Greeley.

Greeley’s Citizen Transportation Advisory Board has recommended a fare increase for Greeley Public Transportation.

Fares will likely increase from $1 to $1.25 come fall.

Tuesday night, the Greeley City Council decided to have no further discussion on the Regional Transit Authority.

While it was not an ‘official vote’, so there doesn’t appear to be a record of which members supported it. Mayor Tom Selders did say he was for it, and Pam Shaddock was against the RTA.

“My belief is that we’re out of time and the RTA is not ready,” said Councilwoman Pam Shaddock.

The Council was stuck on two major issues. The lack of an ‘opt-out’ option and the fear that Greeley dollars would be used to improve the roads around Centerra near I-25.

This first issue seems legitimate, but the second is not. Highway 34 from I-25 is THE main artery into Greeley. Travel between Greeley, Loveland and Fort Collins has already become problematic. Without a significant investment at Centerra, the problem will continue to grow. If the US 34 Corridor is not kept open Greeley will become even more isolated from it’s Northern Colorado neighbors.

The bottom line is that now Loveland is the sole remaining large city involved with the RTA project. Will Loveland be enough to keep the dream alive? Will the Loveland voters approve a project where they stand alone? If the RTA does come into existence, will Loveland reap the rewards and become the Northern Colorado transportation hub?

It will be interesting to see.

Regional Transporation Authority supporters have created a new brand, FastForwardNorth.

This new brand and website is focused on informing potential voters on the proposed Regional Transportation Authority, they even have a survey designed to get public feedback on local transportation needs.

The Fort Collins City Council has decided against a Regional Transit Authority because they can’t afford to contribute.

Ben Manvel, Fort Collins city councilman, said Fort Collins leaders pulled out of the deal because they didn’t feel the city would be ready to approve something for people to vote on by November. He also said the city was not financially in a position to be involved.

The “Citizens’ Steering Committee” has asked the City Council to reconsider.

Fort Collins needs to step up as the leader in Northern Colorado. Transportation Infrastructure is a huge looming problem for our region and the time to spend money on it is now. The longer we wait, the worse the problem will be and the more it will cost.

Evelyn King has an interesting editorial on the proposed Northern Colorado regional transit authority.

She claims that ’special interest groups’, namely Bus and Rail, are attempting to acquire the majority of funds to push through their programs.

Her proposed solution our growing transportation problems is not more public transit, but more roads.

She claims that transit programs will not reduce gridlock, only new roads will… and on that point she is correct. The bottom line is that the majority of Coloradoans don’t want to use public transportation. Driving is much more convenient and independent. Public transportation will never reduce gridlock for one reason, gridlock is the major reason most of us would choose to use public transportation.

King states that:

Data shows that only New York’s transit carries more than either 15 percent of commuters or 10 percent of all travel. Additionally, only the Washington, D.C.; Boston, Chicago, Philadelphia and San Francisco areas carry more than either 10 percent of commuters or 5 percent of all travel. We do know that Denver’s FasTracks was planned to carry only about 2 percent of all travel; and, the Interstate 25 Study also indicated that neither rail/bus transit programs could attract more than 2 percent of all travel.

While I will not dispute her quoted statistics, I do find them incomplete. If New York (I’m assuming New York City, but the reference isn’t clear) transit carries 15 percent of commuters. What kind of impact would a 15 percent, 10 percent or even 5 percent reduction in traffic have on gridlock on I-25 during peak traffic times? As gridlock increases, wouldn’t public transportation usage increase as well?

Her point is well taken, perhaps we do need new highways, but transportation MUST be well funded and well thought out - and mass transit must not be dismissed. Mass transit usability and cost efficiency problems must be solved and citizens must be given adequate motivation to use it. The longer we wait the more difficult it will be to do and if the problems aren’t addressed soon Colorado will just be another Southern California.

Greeley Citizen Transportation Advisory Board met Monday to hear about a plan to bring a high speed rail line to Northern Colorado. The Rocky Mountain Rail Authority has a grant from the Colorado Department of Transportation to study the feasability of a plan to connect Greeley to the Denver Metro area.

This is an exciting development. They want to take the plan to voters by 2008.

Within the next year busses will connect the Greeley mall to east Loveland. This is undoubtably a great step in the right direction, but both Loveland and Greeley need to make sure this isn’t a wasted effort and bolster their in-town public transportation to support this new route.