Joe Tarr
Department of Health Services, 1 W. Wilson St.
Two public meetings on the high-speed rail project linking Madison to Milwaukee will be held this week, focusing on where to locate the Madison's downtown station.
The meetings will be: 4:30 to 7:30 p.m., Tuesday at East High School, 2222 E. Washington Ave. and 4:30 to 7:30 p.m. Wednesday at the state Department of Administration building, 101 E. Wilson St.
"There's no reason for someone to go to both meetings," says Chris Klein, executive assistant with the state Department of Transportation. "It'll be the same information on both days."
The meetings will be to gather input on where to locate downtown Madison's rail station. Specifically, two state buildings are being considered on either side of Monona Terrace: The Department of Administration building just east of the Terrace and the Department of Health Services, 1 W. Wilson St., on the other side of the Terrace. The state would retrofit either of the buildings as a train station.
A third proposal -- Kenton Peters' proposal to build a new building on Pinckney Street between the Administration building at the Terrace -- though not being strongly considered, is also a possibility, Klein says.
"I don't want to take anything off the table until the public weighs in on it," he says. "Unless something is clearly dysfunctional and won't work, we won't take it off the table."
The Department of Transportation hopes to decide on an exact station location by early July, Klein says. At that point, it'll start looking at specific design elements. People concerned about other elements of the project -- such as right of way, street closings and fences along rail line -- won't get any answers at this week's meeting.
"All that will come when we do the design of the corridor," Klein says. "We're just not able to answer all of [residents'] questions yet, because we're just not at that stage."
