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TAYLORSVILLE — Utah transit officials first unveiled their plans for a rapid transit bus system through the middle portion of western Salt Lake County in late 2018; almost four years later, the plan is again gaining steam with a possibility that construction may begin as early as next year.
The Utah Transit Authority recently completed its environmental assessment for the Midvalley Connector Bus Rapid Transit project, a 7-mile system that would run through parts of Murray, Taylorsville and West Valley City. The new review is currently in the middle of a public comment period.
"We really want to provide local and regional connections to the larger regional transit systems (in Murray and West Valley City)," said Marcus Bennett, a UTA project manager, during an online open house session Monday afternoon. "We want to provide for the future and invest in an alternate mode of transportation since we know there will be increased population growth and demand for travel."
If all goes to plan, Bennett said construction could begin in 2023 and wrap up in 2025. He adds that the service will also be free to ride for the first five years of service under a proposed federal partnership.
What is the Midvalley Connector BRT?
A bus rapid transit is a project that essentially merges UTA's TRAX light rail and bus systems into one. It's a bus service that uses both shared and exclusive lanes with TRAX-like stations throughout the route. The agency debuted the concept in 2018 when it launched the Utah Valley Express.
Bennett explains that these projects offer TRAX-like service but at a faster construction pace and a cheaper cost than a light rail project.
A few similar projects have been proposed or discussed since then but only the Ogden Express is currently under construction. The $130 million project is slated to be completed in 2023.
The Midvalley Connector project is one of the others that were proposed. UTA began public engagement in November 2018 but the idea stalled by the end of 2020 when local funds were not set aside for it. The design process resumed in December 2021 when UTA instead started pursuing federal funds to complete the $103 million project, according to Bennett.
That's when they went back to the drawing board to conduct an environmental assessment with the Federal Transportation Administration acting as the lead agency.
Most of the ideas proposed four years ago remain in place today. The plan is to have buses run every 15 minutes between two main terminuses, the Murray Central and West Valley Central stations. There are 15 total proposed stations all about a half-mile apart, including a new bus hub at Salt Lake Community College in Taylorville located in between the terminuses.
"In all of these stations, there are enhanced amenities," said Newel Jensen, a UTA executive project manager, explaining that the stations will include seating, windscreens and real-time passenger information boards.
"It has a look and feel more akin to, say, a light-rail system than a traditional local bus service system," he added.
The proposed path uses mostly shared lanes but includes almost a mile and a half of exclusive bus lanes on 4700 South. The lanes that are shared will have priority traffic signal status, which helps the bus to avoid congestion.
There have only been a couple of tweaks since 2018, Bennett said. The initial plan called for some route space through a neighborhood at 1780 West by Redwood Road near the Salt Lake Community College campus; however, the new plan uses Redwood Road and Community Boulevard instead. Another change is to move a turn on 4700 South from 1175 West to 1300 West, based on a meeting held about the design earlier this year.
The plan is to have a fleet of 10 electric buses. Autumn Few, an environmental expert for UTA, said if that's the case, then it would result in no noise and fewer emissions than diesel buses. Overall, she said there aren't many adverse impacts to the area aside from the short-term noise and other effects related to future construction.
Of the possible impacts, she said the agency will conduct a stormwater pollution prevention plan and erosion control plan to reduce possible runoff and erosion impacts caused by "increased impervious surfaces."
What happens next?
Utahns will have until Aug. 2 to submit public comments on the environmental assessment through a website. UTA held an open house at Taylorsville City Hall on Monday evening in addition to an online open house earlier in the day.
Bennett said the $103 million estimated cost takes into account "substantial" inflation rates now and in the future. Record-high rates have impacted construction projects all over the globe over the past few months.
"That is very much an issue for us; however, it is presently accounted for in our current funding plan," he said.
The zero-cost fare is a condition tied to receiving federal funds, as is the case for the forthcoming Ogden Express.
If all goes as planned, Bennett said the Federal Transportation Administration could accept the environmental review by the end of the year. That's when the federal agency will rate the project compared to others, which will determine if funds will arrive in 2023 or at a later time.
Construction could begin as early as next year; it would likely wrap up in 2025 in a best-case scenario.
