MetroLink expansion in St. Louis is officially off the table.
The board of the Bi-State Development Agency, which oversees the region’s mass transit, voted Friday to begin studying a north-south bus rapid transit system instead.
“I’m personally a little disappointed,” the agency’s president and CEO Taulby Roach said in an interview about the move. “I'd love to build Metrolink, but the reality is, we have to advance projects to both our DC partners and to Room 200 in City Hall that make economic sense.”
The move by the board was not a surprise. Mayor Cara Spencer had asked the agency to pause the light rail project known as the Green Line in April and canceled it earlier this week over cost concerns.
“It’s imperative we have a project that meets our objectives and qualifies for federal funding, which is necessary to make the project viable,” Spencer said in a statement Friday. “Unfortunately, the Green Line, as proposed, has a $1.1 billion price tag for just 10 stations and less than 6 miles, making this project out of reach for our current funding stream and uncompetitive for federal funding.”
The 5.6-mile line was to run along Jefferson Avenue from Chippewa Street to Fairground Park. A bus rapid transit system of the same length or longer could be $500 million or less, Roach said.
“We don’t have as much right-of-way relocation, especially with utilities,” he said. “We don’t have the rail bed, we don’t have a catenary [the overhead wires powering the train], and it’s an independent vehicle.”
The pivot to BRT does not negate the nearly two years of design work that has been done for the Green Line, Roach said. Much of the environmental assessments and public outreach will still stand, as could the station locations.
Roach said it’s possible the agency could start applying for federal funds in August 2026, but there are still a lot of unknowns. The largest is the fate of a 2017 sales tax increase that specifically directs 60% of the proceeds to MetroLink expansion. There is currently about $90 million in the fund.
