A new exhibit at the Landmark Center of photographs of downtown St. Paul from 1978 has ties to the once-proposed downtown people mover that was nixed in 1980. Aaron Isaacs briefly recounted the never-built people mover’s history on this site last year.
Here’s the map of the preferred route and stations from the March 1979 final report for Preliminary Engineering and Related Studies for Saint Paul Downtown People Mover.
Preferred Route and Stations for the Saint Paul Downtown People Mover, 1979
And here’s a bonus map for the first Map Monday in May: the May 1979 cover of Mass Transit with the cities competing to build a people mover system first.
Mass Transit Cover from May 1979
The intro to the article about St. Paul might sound familiar today, except for the people mover part:
In St. Paul, this complaint is perennial: Why do airline pilots arriving in the Twin Cities always announce to their passengers the temperature in Minneapolis, the time in Minneapolis? Or, if they do mention St. Paul, why is it Minneapolis-St. Paul? St. Paulites reportedly chafe at the injustice.
Well, if all goes as planned, the people mover idea may help change all that.
In the end, Detroit and Miami built people movers, which are both still operating today.
Taking the Miami People Mover was easily my dumbest ever transit experience. The good news is that they built it high in the air, so when South Florida returns to the ocean, the People Mover will remain as a monument to the folly of man.
* … the folly of Florida man.
Jacksonville Florida and Las Colinas (a suburban business park in the Dallas area) also built people mover systems.
This is so cray