Milwaukee — Committee OKs Streetcar

Rail Transit Online, August 2007

A downtown streetcar circulator proposed by Mayor Tom Barrett was barely approved by the city council’s Zoning, Neighborhoods & Development Committee on July 3.  The committee was to vote on a routine resolution endorsing land-use plans near future commuter rail stations but Alderman Bob Bauman added an amendment calling for the streetcar and for identifying new sources of funding for both the proposed Kenosha-Racine-Milwaukee (KRM) commuter rail link and the local bus transit system.  A suggested $13 increase in the rental-car tax to pay for KRM has drawn widespread opposition because it does nothing to help the buses.   Bauman said a streetcar loop to carry passengers from the railroad station to downtown destinations had to be part of the KRM scheme.