Detroit M-1 Rail Officials Release 2015 Construction Plans

Officials with the Detroit light rail line detailed which sections of Woodward will be under construction in 2015.

J. Carlisle Larsen (WDET)

Officials building a light rail line in Detroit’s business district say they plan to finish laying streetcar track on the city’s lower Woodward Avenue before Thanksgiving of this year. M-1 Rail Chief Operating Officer Paul Childs says construction in Detroit’s Midtown and New Center areas will continue to leave a few lanes of traffic open, but crews will need to close parts of Woodward leading to the Campus Martius park from June to October. He says about 90-percent of the rail line should be completed by the end of this year.

“The basic trackwork, that piece will be done. Obviously we’re coming back the next year with what we’re calling our systems work. So we’ll have all of our flat work, all of our civil work, you know the vast majority of the rail, the vast majority of the road work done, all the drainage work, all those things will be done.”

-Paul Childs

Childs says work including stringing wire and placing streetcar stations is scheduled for 2016. He says the Penske Tech Center in the New Center area will be ready for M-1 rail offices to move in by the end of this year.

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