Columbus — Streetcar Proposed

Rail Transit Online, March 2006

The city will team up with the business community to finance a $250,000 feasibility study for a proposed downtown circulator streetcar.  However, said Mayor Michael B. Coleman in his annual State of the City speech on Feb. 23, trolleys “…must be affordable to build and operate without a citywide tax increase.”  Coleman is hoping the federal government will pay for much of the project, if it’s eventually approved, through the new Small Starts program, which is limited to schemes costing less than $250 million.  “What Coleman is saying is we’re going to seize the day,” Lawrence Fisher, president of the Columbus Downtown Development Corp., told The Columbus Dispatch.  “We want to be one of the first in line.”  Preliminary details concerning routes, ridership and capital costs would be developed by the study; a line from Ohio State University to downtown could be a high priority.  Among the firms contributing to the analysis are two major insurance companies, a health care organization and the Dispatch.  Coleman is also appointing members of a government-business committee to determine if streetcars are a viable option for Columbus and whether rail transportation will help spur redevelopment and boost the economy.  Central Ohio Transit Authority (COTA) President and Chief Executive Officer William Lhota says his agency favors the trolley concept but will continue to develop its own rail proposals.  COTA has been working on a light rail line linking downtown with suburban Polaris for a decade but has been unable to get local voters to approve a sales tax increase that would cover the local share of construction costs.  The agency plans to try again on the November ballot.