By JOHN CHARLES WILSON
If you go to the Mall of America by bus or light rail, you either know or soon will know that the new Mall of America Transit Center is now open. A Grand Opening celebration will be held in November 2019. Check https://www.metrotransit.org for more details.
In other news, Metro Transit is holding public forums to discuss plans for connecting bus service to the new Orange Line which will run on I-35W starting in 2021.
These forums will be held:
Wednesday, November 6
4:00-6:00 pm
Woodlake Nature Center
6710 Lake Shore Dr. S., Richfield, near bus lines 4,
515, and 558.
Thursday, November 7
4:00-6:00 pm
Martin Luther King Recreation Center
4055 Nicollet Ave., Minneapolis, on bus line 18.
Thursday, November 14
4:30-6:30 pm
Volunteers Enlisted to Assist People (VEAP)
9600 Aldrich Ave. S., Bloomington, near bus lines
18 and 535.
Please consider coming to one of these forums if you have the time and interest.
A friend of mine recently asked if Metro Transit has regular public meetings. The answer is complex. Metro Transit itself is a service provided by the Metropolitan Council; it is not in and of itself a political entity. (Historically, it was, when it was called the Metropolitan Transit Commission, but it was absorbed by the Metropolitan Council in the
mid-1990s.) The Metro Council itself has two full meetings per month, on the 2nd and 4th Wednesdays at 4:00pm. The Transportation Committee, which is the most direct overseer of Metro Transit, also meets twice per month, on the 2nd and 4th Mondays, also at 4pm. These meetings are open to the public though not advertised and very few people go. Maybe you should!