Light Rail on Robert St.

By Bill Jungbauer

It is time for me to tell you everything I know about the proposal to run a light rail line down Robert St. in W. St. Paul.

It began in January 2006. Betty McCollum was hosting a town hall meeting at the Northern Dakota County Service Center. It was at this meeting that Senator Metzen hoisted up a map with a line drawn right down Robert St. Also in attendance were Rep. Rick Hansen and W. St. Paul Mayor Jon Zanmiller.

Any one who paid any attention to last falls race between Jim Metzen and myself will remember how Senator Metzen vehemently denied that he had any intentions of light rail on Robert St. Well check out this web site,

http://mpls.startribune.com/news/metro/elections/profiles/26491.html

Here you will see that Metzen said, “Nor will I stop working on the Robert Street light-rail project.”

If you notice the time and date when this page was published, (Tuesday, November 07 08:31:51 AM the day of the election,) I am sure you will agree that it was sneaky and deceitful on his part.

I attended the Taxpayers Rally at the Capitol and I had a great time and met many wonderful people. When the fun was over it was time to take a stroll down to the Global Warming Rally. I had just missed Jimmy (that’s Metzen!) at the Sierra Club tent. He was handing out fliers titled “Let’s Bring Light Rail to Dakota County.”

It is loaded with information on the future of light rail on Robert St. You can view all of this at,

http://www.northstar.sierraclub.org/dakota

Representative Rick Hansen is in on the scam to. Have you ever seen or heard any of this mentioned by him?

W. St. Paul Mayor John Zanmiller is honest and open about this. I am glad some one is. I asked the Mayor about this last January. He told me it is going to run all the way to Rochester. When I asked him where do you plan on putting it he said it is going to be elevated. Mayor Zanmiller, by the way, is representing W. St. Paul on a Metropolitan Council task force on this very issue.

At this web site you can see that what looks like eleven people.
http://northstar.sierraclub.org/campaigns/sierracommunities/ndc/20060507knockABlock.html
They went door knocking and collected forty post cards in support for light rail down Robert St. I believe there are roughly 22,000 residents of W. St. Paul. Looks like they have there work cut out for them.

What I know of the Sierra Club is that they spend none of their own money on what they believe in. They lobby our elected officials to spend our tax dollars for their purposes.