Add Boise, Idaho, and Anchorage, Alaska, to a list of locations expressing interest in launching commuter rail service.
The Community Planning Association of Southwest Idaho (COMPASS) last week selected commuter rail as its preferred form of future mass transit, based on a study that has been in progress since January 2024. The planned service would use an existing Union Pacific route connecting Caldwell, Nampa, Meridian, and Boise, an area projected to have a population of 1.1 million by 2050, according to COMPASS.
Commuter rail was the considered the best choice by 80% of respondents to the study. “That gives me a great deal of confidence that selecting commuter rail was the right thing to do,” COMPASS Executive Director Craig Raborn told the Idaho Business Review. “However, it is preliminary; we are not locked in to that decision ― if something significant were to change, the COMPASS board certainly can, and will, consider that before final decisions are made.”…