SWRC Coalition Core Project Team Meeting
May 9, 2005
Minutes
Present: Smyth, Schwartz, Bohannan, Herr-Cardillo (by phone) and Garey
Absent: Tevlin and Pearsall
Calendar: Late June, 2005 (TBD, April Manchester to set up) - SWRC Coalition Core Team meeting at Goodman-Schwartz
Sept, 2005 (date TBD) - SWRC Coalition (Full Team) Meeting at Goodman-Schwartz
Action Items: 1) Bohannan to contact Gene Skoropowski, CALTRAN relative to contacting the UP
2) Bohannan to contact Mack Luckie, Yuma MPO about joining the coalition
3) Schwartz to contact Valley Metro Rail about joining the coalition
4) Bohannan to contact Bill Lester (sp?) Central Arizona Association of Governments (Pinal and Gila counties) about joining the coalition
5) Schwartz to set up a meeting with Thayer Verschoor, Senate Transportation Chair. Bohannan and Schwartz to represents the SWRC Coalition
6) Herr-Cardillo, Farley and Caywood to develop/identify a “champion” in the Tucson area
The following items were discussed during the meeting. Action items are listed above.
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Smyth reviewed the status of action items from the March 14th Coalition meeting.
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Pearsall and Lindley revised the SWRC “white paper” based on more input from the coalition members. The “white paper” dated May will be on the SWRC web site soon.
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Smyth/Schwartz/Bohannan reported the presentation on the SWRC to the Arizona Transit Association’s Annual Meeting in Rio Rico on April , 2005. There were about 40 in attendance. Must of the discussion was very supportive of the Coalition’s efforts. AzTA was invited to join the SWRC Coalition. The AzTA board will discuss joining the SWRC Coalition and respond in May
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Schwartz reported that the Friends of Transit have provided $5000 in their budget to support the SWRC Coalition expenses.
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Smyth reported on his meetings with both the New Mexico group advocating commuter rail (www.nmrails.org) and Chris Blewett, Director of Transportation and Planning, Mid Region Council of Governments (www.mrcog-nm.gov). Chris is leading the commuter rail project through Albuquerque for the state. He stated he would help all he can with our project. The Coalition needs to follow the New Mexico project and stay in touch with Blewett.
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Garey reported on the Amtrak situation. Amtrak and long distant trains will keep running. The federal/state split on cost will have to be 80/20. The class 1 railroads state that they should run passenger trains on their tracks, but the infrastructure and full allocated cost must be paid for. The freight railroads want to deal with a single operator (e.g. Amtrak). The key passenger rail people at UP and BNSF are Tom Mulligan and D.J. Mitchell respectively.
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It was agreed to hold off talking to Pastor, Grijalva and Hayworth until later in the year.
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Smyth/Schwartz met with Fred Corey of Kimley-Horn. Fred is not involved with rail but he will set up a meeting with the right people at Kimley-Horn, potentially including Dave Perkins of their Tucson office.
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Smyth/Schwartz meet with John Ducan retired from BNSF and CEO of the San Pedro and Southwestern railroad. John will help were he can. He can facilitate meetings with UP and will provide the Coalition with some contact information.
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Smyth/Schwartz met with Clancy Jayne, ex-legislator and currently a consultant to developer. One current interest is the area from Queen Creek to Florence along the Copper Basin Railway right-a-way. Clancy is pushing for commuter rail from Florence to downtown Phoenix. We agreed to keep each other informed of our activities.
Jay R. Smyth, PhD, PRP, PMP
Coordinator, SWRC Coalition