Bellwater will spend $450,000 studying whether to extend rapid-bus service into Cedar Hollow, after City Manager Marcus Whitfield's office moved quickly to secure a state transportation planning grant that Council Member Gary Petrowski had pushed for since last year's transit corridor debate.
The study, awarded to an outside transportation planning firm, will examine whether Cedar Hollow could be connected to the rapid-bus corridor the council approved 5-2 last year linking West Bellwater, Downtown Core and Foundry Row, either through a direct extension of the existing route or a separate spur line. City Manager Marcus Whitfield said his office moved quickly to apply for the state transportation planning grant covering most of the study’s cost after Petrowski flagged the funding opportunity and a looming application deadline.
“This is the same promise Council President Kowalczyk made on the floor when we voted for the original corridor: that Cedar Hollow and Riverside Heights would be next in line,” Petrowski said. “A study isn’t a bus. But it’s the first concrete step my district has gotten on this issue in longer than I’ve been on the council.”
What the study will examine
Whitfield said the consultant’s scope of work would include several questions the city needs answered before proposing any specific route, including:
- Projected ridership for a Cedar Hollow extension or spur route
- Estimated construction and annual operating costs
- Whether existing roadway infrastructure can support dedicated bus lanes without major reconstruction
- A recommended timeline for design, funding and construction if the council chooses to move forward
The study is expected to take roughly ten months, with a draft report due to the council before the next budget cycle begins. Whitfield cautioned that a favorable feasibility finding would not guarantee construction funding, which would require a separate council appropriation similar to the $34 million measure recently approved for the corridor’s West Bellwater and Foundry Row segments.
I don’t want Cedar Hollow residents to think a feasibility study is the same thing as a groundbreaking. It’s a necessary step, and I’m glad we got the grant to pay for most of it, but there’s a funding vote still ahead of us if the numbers come back favorable.
Marcus Whitfield, Bellwater City Manager
Rosalind Kepler, a Cedar Hollow homeowner who has attended council meetings pushing for improved bus service for years, said she was cautiously encouraged but wary of the timeline. “We’ve heard promises about buses in this neighborhood since before some of these council members were elected,” Kepler said. “A study is real progress. I’ll believe there’s an actual bus running down our street when I’m standing at the stop waiting for it.”
Riverside Heights watching closely
The Cedar Hollow study’s quick approval has drawn attention from Riverside Heights, whose council member, Aisha Muhammad, has separately pushed for a similar study in her own district. Whitfield said the difference in timing reflected the fact that Cedar Hollow’s study was tied to a specific state grant deadline, while a Riverside Heights study would likely need general fund dollars or a future grant cycle. “It isn’t about which district we favor,” Whitfield said. “It’s about which application had a deadline attached to it first.”
Petrowski said he supported Muhammad’s push and did not view the two studies as competing for the same resources. “My constituents waited a long time for anyone to take this seriously,” Petrowski said. “That doesn’t mean I want Riverside Heights to wait the same amount of time. I’ll vote to fund their study the moment there’s a realistic source of money on the table.”
Council President Walter Kowalczyk said he hoped the Cedar Hollow study’s progress would put pressure on the council to identify a funding path for Riverside Heights sooner rather than later. “We made a promise to two neighborhoods in the same meeting,” Kowalczyk said. “I don’t want history to record that we only kept it for one of them because the paperwork happened to be easier.”
Whitfield’s office said community input sessions for the Cedar Hollow study would begin within the next two months, with residents invited to weigh in on priority destinations and current pain points in the neighborhood’s existing bus service before the consultant finalizes its route analysis.
Kepler said she planned to attend the first input session and to bring neighbors who have relied on the existing bus line to reach jobs at the Riverside Free Clinic and the hardware stores along Cedar Hollow’s commercial strip. “The consultants are going to ask us where we want to go,” Kepler said. “We’ve been telling the city that for years. I just hope somebody’s finally writing it down in a way that turns into a route map instead of another binder on a shelf.”
Petrowski said he intended to hold his own town hall ahead of the consultant’s first community session, hoping to arm residents with specifics about the study’s scope before they are asked to weigh in. “I don’t want people walking into that first meeting not knowing what’s actually being studied,” Petrowski said. “If Cedar Hollow shows up organized and specific about what we need, I think that gives the consultants a much stronger case to bring back to the council.”