Growing traffic between Tucson and Phoenix has raised concern about future congestion along Interstate-10 as both cities increase in population.
As a result, the Arizona Department of Transportation is hoping to build a passenger rail connecting the two cities to divert traffic away from the highway.
“We should be looking at a multimodal system and not just be depending on highways in the future so as the first step to enact that vision we’re looking at Phoenix to Tucson and the other choices that we can look at between the two cities,” said Mike Kies, project manager from the ADOT Intercity Rail Study.
By 2050 the Maricopa Association of Government and ADOT project said the Phoenix and Tucson metropolitan areas could grow as large as 10 to 12 million people. Kies said that I-10 currently sees about 60,000 to 70,000 vehicles per day.
“It’s projected to go up a lot more than that and so widening Interstate-10 is one option that the Department of Transportation is looking at,” Kies said. “But (the passenger rail) could be another option to using Interstate-10.”
Transportation Director for the Maricopa Association of Government Eric Anderson said the rise in population would be due to natural increase with a higher birth to death ratio. Anderson said Maricopa County is right under four million people, but it could be at six million citizens by 2030.
Anderson agreed the passenger train could combat the growing population and traffic because a freeway connecting to Tucson from the west is “not going to be enough.”
The ADOT Intercity Rail Study is asking for the public to give opinions on the potential rail at open houses in Maricopa, Pinal and Pima counties throughout October.
ADOT stopped at the Tempe campus Wednesday on Hayden Lawn to get student involvement and input on the initiative.
Of the general public, Serena Unrein, with the Arizona Public Interest Research Group, said that citizens of Phoenix and Tucson are positive about a passenger rail being built.
“People have told us that this is something that they really want so we’re making sure that Arizona’s decision makers know that this needs to happen,” Unrein said. “The overwhelming response that I get when I talk to people about this is, ‘Why don’t we have this yet?’”
A concern most citizens are having, however, is where the funding for the project will come from. Kies said early estimates for the construction of the rail is about $2 billion but ADOT will have a refined and more detailed cost estimate as the study continues.
Unrein said funding of more than $10 billion by the federal government has gone into passenger and high-speed rails across the country but not Arizona’s.
“Arizona could benefit from future high speed rail or passenger rail investments if those were to come up again,” Unrein said. “Now if those opportunities were to come up again because we now have a state rail plan in place … we’d really be able to use that money for the first time in Arizona’s history.”
If the passenger rail does get built then it will help create jobs in the coming years not only for construction but also for economic development in the areas near rail stations, Unrein said.
“The passenger rail is great for the economy,” she said. “It creates jobs just from the building of passenger rail and it would really give Arizona’s manufacturing sector a shot in the arm at a time when it couldn’t be more important.”
Reach the reporter at sraymund@asu.edu
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