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LRT costs <br />Continued from page 1. <br />on the University Av. corridor;' Sivanich <br />said, "plus relocating utilities." <br />Planners haven't yet decided whether all <br />utilities, such as water and gas, would <br />need to be moved. The tracks are to be <br />laid on top of a concrete slab. It's pos- <br />sible that if a utility under the slab <br />needed repair, workers could dig in to it <br />• from the side of the slab. <br />WHICH SEGMENTS <br />But the biggest fluctuation in costs de- <br />pends on how much of any corridor is to <br />be built. The three corridors are divided <br />into 10 segments, almost any combina- <br />tion of which might be built. A decision <br />might be made, for instance, to build an <br />LRT line from downtown St. Paul to <br />downtown Minneapolis to Hopkins — <br />segments 1, 2 and 6 in the accompany- <br />ing illustration. The cost of those 18 <br />miles would be an estimated $187 million. <br />Sivanich compared the total cost of the <br />LRT system with that of a proposed Hen- <br />nepin County garbage - burning facility. <br />"Our garbage burner is going to cost <br />$400 million," he said. "I think LRT is <br />a cost - effective method of transporta- <br />tion. That ($381 million) is not a lot of <br />money for a system that's going to last <br />50 years," <br />The cost figures are in 1984 dollars, <br />"but of course the money wouldn't all <br />be spent at once," Sivanich said. Costs <br />would increase by about five percent a <br />year owing to inflation, he said. <br />The southwest corridor could be started <br />soonest, in 1986, Sivanich said, since the <br />right-of-way --the Chicago - Northwestern <br />railroad tracks —is already owned by <br />Hennepin County. "But of course we <br />don't know yet which corridor will be <br />recommended first." <br />Nancy Ann lomet <br />