All aboard? What's in the new $3.1B transit proposal

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I'm Metro government reporter Cassandra Stephenson.

🚦 Nashville Mayor Freddie O'Connell donned a Peanuts transit-themed tie on Friday to deliver the final details of a proposed transit program and the half-cent sales tax increase to pay for it.

The roughly $3.1 billion "Choose How You Move" program's multitude of projects include 86 miles of new or updated sidewalks, upgrades to nearly 600 traffic signals to help reduce time wasted at red lights and the expansion and improvement of the WeGo bus system.

O'Connell said the half-cent sales tax bump would cost the average Nashville family about $70 per year.

While the financial details of the plan await approval from a third-party audit and the state comptroller, O'Connell and transit referendum supporters have started campaigning for support. Davidson County voters will decide whether the improvements are worth the tax increase on Nov. 5.

"Choose How You Move" would dedicate around $130 million (estimated in today's dollars) to build 12 new transit hubs throughout Davidson County, modeled after existing hubs like WeGo Central in downtown and a smaller WeGo center near Hillsboro High School. The Dr. Ernest Rip Patton, Jr. North Nashville Transit Center, which has often been used as an example of what Nashville's transit future could look like, will celebrate its upcoming opening with a ribbon-cutting in June.

The program would also set aside funding to purchase around 26 acres of land near those transit centers to ultimately be used for things like housing, parks and other public benefits.

Here's a sampling of other improvements the proposed tax increase would fund:

• 285 upgraded bus stops
• 17 park-and-ride locations
• 65 new buses
• 54 miles of high-capacity transit corridor upgrades for vehicles, buses, cyclists and pedestrians on the city's heaviest traffic routes
• 39 miles of complete streets, including bikeway construction and safety improvements to Nashville's most dangerous roadways

Read more on the transit plan here.

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— Cassandra Stephenson, The Tennessean