Construction officially began this week on a tunnel that is part of DART’s new rail line, the Silver Line Regional Rail Project, which will link Collin County to DFW Airport.
According to a statement from DART, the work will include the installation of asphalt detours for utility relocation and the demolition of median sections. The construction will continue through November 18.
The project will significantly alter traffic flow on certain roads.
Hillcrest Road, which runs north-south, will be reduced to one traffic lane or shut down completely beginning Monday, August 29. The northbound lanes of Hillcrest Road between McKamy and McCallum Boulevards will also be closed.
Some Dallas residents expressed concern that this construction work could impact public safety for thousands of residents.
For example, the lane and road closures would temporarily affect emergency responders and neighborhood traffic.
“It’s not that I’m dreading it,” said Steffani Bailin. “I’m fearful. I’m scared.”
Bailin is a longtime resident of The Highlands at McKamy, a neighborhood in Far North Dallas.
Once the project construction begins, Hillcrest Road closures could divert traffic through The Highlands’ nearby street of Meandering Way, which is home to 98 addresses and 276 properties.
“I think it will be very dangerous,” said Lois Orrico, another neighborhood resident. He said when he walks on the trail and on the sidewalks, “the cars go too quickly here now.” With more traffic, he said, “it’s only going to be a nightmare.”
DART said it plans to direct detoured traffic to Preston Road or Coit Road and install “Local Traffic Only” signs on Meandering Way to deter traffic.
The Highlands resident Kay Marshall shared Orrico’s concern.
“I retired recently from Franklin Middle School, which is the middle school that our neighborhood feeds into,” she said. “So I know that there are walkers to that school, and kids are not always as careful as they should be.”
She said the traffic already goes “faster than it should” on the street. “And if it’s busier and faster, I think that it’s going to be an issue. ”
Dallas Councilwoman Cara Mendelsohn also spoke about the potential for safety hazards stemming from the rail line construction.
“Because we are the farthest north part of North Dallas, we often don’t get the same response,” Mendelsohn said, referring to emergency response services. “So to then cut off some really big roads, I’m worried about that.”
In a statement, DART said it works closely with the Dallas Police Department and Dallas Fire-Rescue to create solutions to ensure all emergency vehicles have full access.
The rail line project was initially planned for six months. City officials said that it could take up to a year.
Several phases for the project were outlined in the official construction activity notification.
The 26-mile Silver Line project will traverse seven cities between DFW Airport, Grapevine, Coppell, Dallas, Carrollton, Addison, Richardson, and Plano, and include 10 new stations. DART’s funding relies primarily on property taxes from its member communities. Revenue service for the Silver Line is scheduled for 2024.
The primary purpose of the Silver Line, as stated by DART, is to provide passenger rail connections and services that will “improve mobility, accessibility and system linkages to major employment, population, and activity centers in the northern part of the DART service area.”
They keep building these expensive trains and I keep seeing them nearly empty much of the time while I sit in traffic! Spend that money on new roads!
If you keep seeing the trains while sitting in traffic, why don’t you get on the train rather than just watching it go by? DFW is already filled with highways and major thoroughfares. More rail is needed in locations that serve as connections so that traffic can be reduced, or at least maintained and not increased 10 fold like it has in the last 20 years.
I never see a train going my way. They are intended to serve mostly commuters, not the general public. He’s also right about the occupancy of the trains outside of rush hour. For many years, DART has had more busses on the streets than at any other time of the day. I once rode an “express” bus, no stops south of north Richardson, operating back and forth between downtown Dallas and the areas from north Richardson. I caught it on Springlake near Custer Road. The driver drove it for the two rush hours and, in between, worked at a barbershop in the downtown area. In the morning, it carried mostly people going downtown to work and, on the way back, mostly people from the Fair Park area and Oak Cliff who made the transfer downtown, mostly at the bus stop in front of the downtown McDonald’s, a very busy place at that time of the day. They were mostly going to jobs as domestic servants or the like in north Richardson, almost all wearing white uniforms of that kind. In the afternoon rush hour, the ridership pattern reversed itself, of course.
Temporary problems that will go away; they just want to complain about something.
Who funds these trains and routes, and who will take a lot of taxpayer money to build them?
oops, maybe I answered my own question.
Have any of you in North Dalkas ever wondered why the portion of Mockingbird Lane runs thru Highland Park cant be widened? That is a major East West thru way in Dallas but it cant be touched? Or the residents in that area cant be inconvenienced by residents who dont live in the 3 zip codes that run thru the “Park Cities”? Its only fare that the road be widened thru Highland Park. They get the use of roads in other areas of Dallas that had to be upgraded for safer travel.
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That’s been a thorn in the public’s side for over 50 years. I can remember the Dallas Morning News (Ahem) once printing an editorial cartoon criticizing the situation. Obviously, it remains because of the political influence of the people in those two cities, especially Highland Park.
Until about 10 or 15 years ago State Hwy 289, commonly known locally as Preston Road, ran south through the Park Cities into the Oak Lawn neighborhood, following Oak Lawn Avenue to N. Stemmons Freeway (IH-35E). The City of Highland Park, until very recently was 100% lily-white and all domestic servants were required to get ID cards issued by the town’s PD. The PD relentlessly accosted any non-white pedestrian and, if they were found without that ID card, they were in big trouble. The state highway route now has its southern terminus at the intersection with W. Northwest Highway at the Dallas city limits because, before then, the local NAACP starting running carloads of demonstrators up and down Preston Road in the Park Cities, complaining about their racist policies. The cities tried to stop the NAACP but the organization sued and won on the grounds that the road was a state highway which was legally open to use by anyone without harassment. Less than a year later, the cities agreed to accept maintenance of the route from the Texas Highway Department, thereby removing the official highway designation from it. Obviously, there was no longer any point in having the route in Oak Lawn so that was gone too.
How much money do these people have? There was a story in the newspaper (Ahem) about 25 years ago about an elderly resident of Highland Park who had routinely received the next year’s city budget statement in the mail for voter examination. Thinking it was an unexpected bill, without blinking, she promptly wrote a check for the full amount shown on the bottom line and sent it back to the city! Of course, the check was returned to her but the story got into the local news reports.
DART’s funding has always been a part of the sales tax collected in the area served, currently limited to .25% by state law. To the best of my knowledge, they get zero property taxes and frequently collect more money than they can use. They have rebated funds in excess of their needs to the cities served and are currently proposing to do that again!
I live on McCallum Blvd and I go all the way to Preston to the Kroger store where I work, will I still be able todo that, its only takes me no more then five minute to get to work and home.