BOROUGH ON A ROLL

WASILLA — If you were hoping for a new retail outlet across from Sears, you’re going to be disappointed but ridesharing commuters are in luck.

All that dirt being turned on that oddly shaped lot will be a new park and ride lot. Commuters have been able to catch a ride on that side of the Valley for some time but have been leaving their cars in commercial lots.

“Wal-Mart and Sears and some of the others, they needed space for their own customers,” said borough transportation planner Brad Sworts.

He said the funding came from the federal stimulus program. The state’s Department of Transportation got some money from that program but it came through the Federal Transit Administration and thus to use it the state would have to comply with all of FTA’s rules.

DOT knows a lot about transportation — roads — but Sworts said they didn’t have a lot of expertise on transit — buses, vans, trains, etc.

“They’re just starting to learn the process of dealing with the Federal Transit Authority,” Sworts said.

But between the ferry and the piece-by-piece buildup of the borough’s nascent bus system, Sworts said Mat-Su has plenty of experience navigating the Federal Transit Administration.

So DOT asked if the borough would step up.

“We said sure we’ll take it on,” Sworts said.

The project was $2 million. Which was enough to also put in a bunch of bus stops.

“There are four or five bus stops in Palmer, another four over in Wasilla and then we’ve got some scattered in between,” Swort said.

He said each site has a variety of needs.

“At some of the stops we’re just putting in signage,” Sworts said. “At other places we’re actually putting in shelters with signs and pullouts and that kind of thing.”

He said that Mat-Su Transit or MASCOT will be the primary user of the stops but they’ll be available to all of the Valley’s bus companies. Valley Mover, which runs between Anchorage and the Valley can use them and so can the Chickaloon Tribe, which has started bus service from the Sutton area into Palmer.

Assuming everything goes according to plan, commuters will be able to use the lot by the time the leaves start falling off the trees.

“I think the funding has some kind of a deadline. You have to complete the project within a year and a half,” Sworts said. “We have to have it pretty much finished by fall, which is fine because that’s the end of the summer.”

Contact Andrew Wellner at andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com or 352-2270.