MINNEAPOLIS — Metro Transit will pull the plug on its Northstar commuter rail service in January due to a lethal combination of low ridership and rising costs.
More frequent bus service will replace the trains beginning Jan. 5, 2026, Metro Transit officials said during a Metropolitan Council meeting yesterday. The last weekday Northstar trip will run on Jan. 2. The Northstar’s last hurrah will be Jan. 3 or 4 after the final Minnesota Vikings home game of the regular season.
The Northstar line currently offers commuter rail service between Big Lake and downtown Minneapolis, stopping at stations in Elk River, Ramsey, Anoka, Coon Rapids, and Fridley.
Like other transit systems, Northstar ridership plunged in the wake of Covid-19 and never recovered.
Before the pandemic of 2020, Northstar carried a maximum average of 2,660 commuters per day. By 2024, ridership had declined to an average of 430 weekday rides. Pre-pandemic projections were for a ridership of 5,590 per day this year.
Officials said it cost more to provide 40 weekday trips this year than it did to provide 72 weekly trips in 2021. Each round-trip Northstar rider cost taxpayers about $233, Metro Transit officials said.
In 2023, the subsidy per Northstar ride was $116.60 compared to $16.07 for commuter bus service.
The picture says the train is departing northwest from Saint Paul. The Northstar never went to Saint Paul. It departs from a station in Minneapolis near the Warehouse district by Target baseball field where the Light Rail from Saint Paul terminates.
Not going to Saint Cloud as was originally intended doomed the service from the start. If the seven mile stretch of single track around Little Falls had the second track added on the BNSF Staples sub at startup or soon after then I believe there would have been a different outcome. Right now terminating in Big Lake in the middle of nowhere, when I boarded several years ago, was and is not an ideal termination point.
MILES —– As I have posted, last Sunday I was on an 8-car (galleries) train on BNSF METRA, packed floor to ceiling. The next train was an hour behind — on a Sunday.
As you say, Miles, weekday rush hour doesn’t cut it. Token service doesn’t cut it.
In transportation, if you’re in financial trouble, there’s only two ways to go. (1) Totally abandon the service, if it’s hopeless and can’t be saved. – OR – (2) Add frequencies.
Scaling back, trimming schedules, has never worked.
The service was never going to be successful once they buy and large gave up running it. A couple round trips a day during weekday rush hour only is such an outdated way of thinking about ‘commuter rail’ it’s no surprise it ended up failing post pandemic.
Plus, stations being isolated from their respective suburban downtowns, surrounded by seas of parking, and ending in farm fields was only going to function as a park and ride system. Maybe if it had ran to St. Cloud from the start it would have been useful as inter-city travel. The way the service was set it, it was probably more of a hassle to use than drive.
Additionally, using full size diesel engines with pulled cars is an expensive way to run a small operation in this day and age. FRA rules may have restricted this, but using DMUs would have been much more cost effective.
All in all, it seems the Metropolitan Council just gave up on ever trying to save or improve the service after it launched.