The Ann Arbor Rail Project

If you're driving 23 south into Ann Arbor, this Bi-Level Passenger Rail Car could be in your future.

Details are still hard to come by, but more info has come to light about the proposed Ann Arbor rail project.

According to an article in MetroMode, the plan seems to be to start in the fall with a single train running between two temporary stations, one in Ann Arbor on Plymouth Rd. and another at the border between Washtenaw and Livingston counties. The Great Lakes Central Rail Road, the company that owns these tracks, would make six trips in the morning and six trips in the evening. A trip takes 20 minutes from station to station.

Thanks to this MDot Rail Map, you can see the basic train route along the black line from Howell to Ann Arbor.

The train would have three passenger cars, each of which is a double decker car that can hold somewhere around 500 passengers. That means each trip, the train could carry around 1500 passengers. The capacity of the system would then be 9000 commuters a day if every train was full. That's 9000 one way in the morning and then 9000 back again in the evening.

Ann Arbor plans to provide bus service to and from the temporary station. I'm not sure about the other end of the line in Livingston, possibly that would be more like a park and ride.

Depending on how well the service works, there are plans to take it farther south into Saline and possibly Monroe and farther North to Howell.

I had to stop calling this the Ann Arbor to Howell rail project once I heard the latest news. I've opted for just calling it the Ann Arbor Rail Project for now.