When you think about it, putting a transit center behind the Library building doesn’t make a lot of sense

Last week, the Summit County Council voted to build a transit center behind the Sheldon Richins Library building. Initially we were a little ambivalent about the project. We weren’t sure if it was the right place. Yet, after reading the Park Record article on it and associated comments on the article, we are pretty sure the County Council made a mistake on this one.

If you haven’t heard, the County is going to build a transit center right behind and to the west of the Library building in Kimball Junction. There will be 10 spaces for buses and 20 spaces for cars. It will serve as a central place where people can connect and transfer between buses.

The problem? It’s in the middle of proverbial-nowhere and it cost $2.4 million.

The Park Record article had a couple of statements that summed it up best. A member of the Kimball Junction business association said that it was great there was a transit center but it would be better on the other side of the road. A co-founder of Newpark said the location was “really wrong” because there was nothing around it and we ‘d have to wait 10 years until something is built around it.

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to realize that it’s not in the right spot. Imagine a transit center right in the heart of the Village at Kimball. You take a direct bus to get dinner and go to the concert by Maxwell’s this summer. Would it happen? At least it has a shot. With this proposal, you take a bus to the area behind the Library, hike a half mile with your kids, lawn chairs, and blankets. Will people do it? I guess we’ll see.

Right now, it seems like a foolish decision to proceed forward with a plan devised in 2010 that doesn’t make a lot of sense given the current situation. We guess we’ll see if it pans out. If not, the transit center should be named after the County Council Members who aproved it and the multi-millions that will be spent building it.