NextStop STL

 St. Louis Downtown Airport firefighters participated in live aircraft firefighting training on June 5 and June 6 at Scott Air Force Base, near Belleville, Illinois, with members of the Scott Air Force Base Fire Department.  All airport firefighters are required by the Federal Aviation Administration to participate in at least annual live aircraft firefighting training [...]

Today Mokhtee Ahmad, Regional Administrator for Region 7, Federal Transit Administration (FTA), Steven Engelhardt, Office of Congressman Lacy Clay, Brian Goggins, President of Byrne & Jones Construction, John Nations, CEO of Metro, and other Metro representatives gathered to talk about the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) projects, public transit, and job creation in St. [...]

Thanks to ARRA, Metro has just started working on improvements to the North Hanley MetroLink Station. Nothing fancy, but these improvements will help the station accommodate higher frequencies of bus service, improve traffic flow, segregate bus traffic from customer vehicles, and provide a smoother ride for customers. Of course, all time schedules are based on [...]

If you’re familiar with downtown St. Louis, you’re familiar with the bridge that was completed in 1874 by James Eads. Metro shares ownership of the Eads Bridge with the City of St. Louis. In 2003, the City rehabbed the road deck – its portion of the bridge – but MetroLink’s track portion hasn’t been rehabbed [...]

This article in The Nation examines the paradox of ARRA funding (federal stimulus funds), which basically provides money to transit systems for expansion but not for operating costs; and mentions St. Louis. It also discusses the rule change allowing some of the capital funds to be converted into operation funds, and looks at the issue [...]