Grant will expand CAT fleet, explore rail system

A $14.7 million federal transportation grant awarded today will expand the Citizens Area Transit bus system and begin preliminary design of an elevated transportation system.

Transportation Secretary Rodney Slater announced the funding this morning at the Downtown Transportation Center as curious commuters shuffled between CAT buses at the city's largest transportation transfer point.

About $7.8 million of the grant will be used to acquire 20 new buses for the CAT system, which has increased ridership 175 percent to about 50 million passengers a year since it began operations in December 1992.

More than $5 million will be dedicated to the preliminary engineering and design of a 5.2-mile fixed-guideway transportation system. Members of the Regional Transportation Commission are expected to decide early next year what type of technology would be used for the system. The two leading contenders are a monorail and a light-rail system.

Monorails are propelled along a single center guideway while light rails use steel train tracks.

The RTC is in the process of drafting an environmental impact statement that would determine the effects of the proposed transit system that would link Cashman Center with the Stardust hotel-casino by way of the Las Vegas Convention Center.

Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., a senior member of the Senate Transportation Appropriations Committee and the Senate Public Works Committee, joined Slater and RTC Chairman Bruce Woodbury in making the announcement.

Slater, who acknowledged that Las Vegas is one of the biggest recipients of federal money in the nation because of the region's growth, credited Reid for helping to get funding legislation through the Senate.

David Parks, assistant director of the RTC, said the 20 new buses, expected to be delivered in March, would primarily be used to expand frequencies of operations on some popular routes, but he added that his staff is investigating route expansions and extensions as well.

Parks said the new buses will cut the wait times from a half-hour to 20 minutes or 20 minutes to 15 minutes on the most popular routes.

CAT's buses are important to the RTC's plans for the fixed-guideway system because planners hope buses eventually will feed passengers to the elevated system running between downtown Las Vegas and the Strip.

Woodbury, credited by Reid as "the father of Las Vegas transportation," said compatibility agreements have been reached between the RTC and investors in the MGM Grand-Bally's monorail system.

The private monorail system, coordinated by Bob Broadbent, is in the process of acquiring use permits that would allow expansion north from the MGM Grand to the Sahara hotel-casino.

Meetings are expected next month or in December to approve the expanded monorail route. The expansion hit snags when the Clark County Planning Commission reviewed it. Residents of a neighborhood adjacent to the Desert Inn Country Club opposed the route because they say it is too close to their homes. Developers of the Venetian hotel-casino also have voiced concerns about the private monorail route.

Under current plans, the monorail and the RTC's fixed-guideway system would meet at three stops.

Some critics have said chances are slim that the two systems would be able to operate on the same tracks because the technology would be different.

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