Draper group seeks referendum on TRAX

A group of Draper residents wants voters to decide where a controversial light-rail line should cut through their city.

Citizens for Responsible Transportation (CRT) plans to start a petition drive this week to seek a ballot referendum on the route that would ask voters whether they approve a TRAX line endorsed by the City Council this month. The city signed off on the group's referendum application Monday.

The local activist group formed earlier this year, in opposition to a proposed TRAX line that cuts through low-density neighborhoods and runs parallel to the popular Porter Rockwell trail. That light-rail line would run along former Union Pacific Railroad tracks, which were purchased as a right-of-way by the Utah Transit Authority in 1993.

Earlier this month, the Draper City Council unanimously voted in favor of that route. But the group of residents is optimistic they will garner the required amount of signatures to put the question before voters.

Last month, 800 residents signed a petition within three days, opposing the route. And CRT is prepared to take the matter to court.

"We think when you do a comprehensive change of your master plan and you do a new map, that's a legislative act, and at some point, the public should have the right to disagree," said Summer Pungh, a CRT member. "We support light rail. We want it in Draper. We just want it on the appropriate alignment and the most appropriate and best place. Bringing light rail on the existing tracks will change Draper forever."

Maridene Hancock, a city spokeswoman, said Draper leaders are not commenting on the possible referendum at this time.

According to state law, CRT would need to collect 1,500 to 1,600 signatures of registered voters to take the issue to a citywide election.

Still feeling the sting of Draper's vote on the resolution, Pungh feels UTA should hold more open houses with viable alternatives.

Although UTA owns property rights to the corridor, it spent the past year studying the option of either putting the TRAX line on the existing right-of-way or building a line along State Street. A panel of UTA, Draper and Wasatch Front Regional Council officials found that the Union Pacific corridor would be the best alternative.

G.J. LaBonty, project manager with UTA, told the City Council on Nov. 15 that the State Street alignment was never an option for UTA, and that left some residents feeling duped.

UTA did not have to get approval through the city to build on the right-of-way, since they own the corridor, but UTA did the study because of federal requirements to receive future funding, LaBonty said.