Partnerships and Investments

It takes commitment and determination to build a rail line. Each community along the line and many private businesses have added their own mark to the project with both independent and shared funding. These add-ons demonstrate that these communities stand by this project. Each city along the line has also had the opportunity to improve streets, sewers, and other infrastructure alongside the METRO Green Line Extension construction.

Community contributions


Eden Prairie

  • Added back the Eden Prairie Town Center station with federal and local funding
  • Reconstructed SouthWest Station passenger waiting area
  • Upgraded, decorative catenary poles supporting the electrical wires that power the light rail
  • Decorative street lighting, planter boxes, and landscaping on Eden Road
  • Enhanced fencing and railing
  • Added visual elements to the Prairie Center Drive bridge, including decorative art and LED lights
  • Improved public plaza with landscaping, concrete pavers, additional benches, trash and recycling bins, bike pump station, electrical service, decorative pavement, bollards, and irrigation.
  • Reconstructed Technology Drive
  • Upgraded and realigned sanitary sewer with new water main casings and increased the size of storm sewer pipes
  • Optum set aside part of its development property for the construction of City West Station

Minnetonka

  • Extended 17th Avenue
  • Upgraded storm sewer casings
  • Added colors and anti-graffiti coating to retaining walls
  • Enhanced fencing and railing

Hopkins

  • Updated 17th Avenue water main and sewer
  • Improved traffic signal at 8th Avenue and Excelsior Boulevard
  • Enhanced the Downtown Hopkins Station plaza
  • Added stairs to the trail underpass at Blake Road

St. Louis Park

  • Improved streetscape at Beltline Boulevard and County Road 25
  • Upgraded railing and added lighting, and stairs for the Beltline trail bridge
  • Upgraded railing on Louisiana trail and light rail bridges
  • Added underpass for Louisiana trail
  • Extended Lynn Avenue and the backage road
  • Included trail underpass stairs at Wooddale Avenue

Safety investments

The METRO Green line prioritizes safety for customers and the cities along the line.

Design and accessibility

We’ve designed the station areas with elements like lighting, communication, and walkability features to provide safe and secure spaces. Customers can expect well-lit, open areas, cameras that monitor station activity in real time, and ways to connect with and alert Metro Transit staff.

Working closely with transit users and advocates for people with disabilities and older adults, we are making sure that we meet and even exceed the Americans with Disabilities Act guidelines for trains, station platforms and crossings.

Station area features

  • Gently sloping access ramps from sidewalk to platform.
  • Tactile warning strips to mark the edge of the platform.
  • Audible and visual warnings at street and track crossings.
  • Wider platforms to allow two wheelchairs to pass side by side.
  • Shelter areas with seating and open spaces for wheelchairs.

Light rail transit vehicles

The new vehicles have spray-on flooring and plastic seats, rather than fabric, which are easier to maintain and clean. The cars are also easier to work on, requiring less staff time to perform routine maintenance.

Inside the new light rail vehicles is a modified design for the middle car. The seats run parallel and face each other across the expanded aisle. This updated middle car design opens the center aisle for people who use mobility devices, increasing the width from 24 inches to 40 inches, and it eliminates knee-to-knee seating, which resulted in people putting their feet on the seats.

Crossing areas

A variety of solutions are employed in the METRO Greenline Extension corridor to increase safety at crossing areas.

  • In Minnetonka at Smetana and Feltl Roads, the city requested that the light rail travel under the road to enable safe travel on the roadway and limit areas of conflict for people walking or biking the area.
  • A trail bridge over Beltline Boulevard, and the light rail and freight rail tracks in St. Louis Park provides a safe connection to the Cedar Lake regional trail.
  • Safety on the regional trail is also improved with tunnels under Wooddale Avenue in St. Louis Park and Blake Road in Hopkins.

Construction


Kenilworth corridor

Tunnel construction in the Kenilworth corridor has used specialized construction equipment and techniques in to reduce vibration and safely build out the passageway. While these methods mostly functioned successfully, construction ran into dense soils and large underground obstructions that slowed progress, and efforts to work around these challenges caused soils to settle in some locations.

To further protect the foundations of nearby buildings, tunnel construction implemented a new method, called a secant wall, to provide additional support while completing the tunnel. A secant wall is a dependable and tested construction method for supported excavation. Using a secant wall does not notably change the tunnel design, it is there to reinforce soils with a series of interlocking concrete cylinders. Unfortunately, this method requires additional time to design and construct, which means an overall delay on construction of the METRO Green Line.

Freight rail

A barrier protection wall between the freight rail and light rail tracks. The corridor protection wall, a safety requirement from BNSF, was added as an additional layer of protection between the freight and light rail trains.

METRO Green Line Extension

Green Line Extension Project Office
Park Place West Building, Suite 500
6465 Wayzata Boulevard
St. Louis Park, MN 55426

Construction hotline: 612-373-3933