Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
This is Grow Omaha, the only radio show that talks
about economic development, construction, business expansion, and all of those
things that make Omaha a great place to live or visit.
Grow Omaha on News Radio eleven ten K.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
Baby, Well, good morning, and welcome to Grow Omaha, the
only show that talks about the growth, development, construction, restaurants,
and all things that make our city a great place
to live. We'd like to thank our sponsors Cheer Athletics,
the nation's number one all star Cheerjim, along with Dingman's
Collision Center, who has four metro locations taking care of
(00:34):
autobody needs and even some mechanical repairs. Trenton and Jeff
have the weekend off, so filling in today. I'm Brad Williams.
I'm a member of the planning team at e and
a consulting group, and I'm also the owner of Brad
Williams Photography. Sitting next to me, my co host today,
is a guy that you've heard on these airwaves before,
but it's been nearly twelve years since he's been here.
(00:56):
Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to the show hallus Chicanos.
Speaker 3 (00:59):
We thank you, Brad. It's fantastic to be back. I've
known Jeff and Trenton for over twenty years and the
same with you, and I'm welcoming the return. It's great
to be back in studio with everybody.
Speaker 2 (01:13):
So even though Lou hasn't joined us for a long time,
he meets with Jeff almost monthly, and Lou and I
get together and talk about all the things going on
in this city almost about every other week, twice a month, probably,
so why he hasn't been here, He's been close to
us this whole time. And one more thing, Lou, happy birthday.
You celebrated a birthday yesterday. Well, thank you, my friend.
(01:35):
I don't know if I'm the year wiser, but I
know I'm the year older, all right. We have a
new grow Omaha Eats restaurant review this week Chris Corey
and his wife Jen. They do a restaurant review every
other week. That review is sponsored by All Makes Office Equipment,
located at twenty fifth and Farham Street. This week, Chris
(01:55):
and Jen review Cumbia on sixteenth Street, located just north
of the Orpheum Theater right next door to Mercury. Chris's
review does a great job telling the story about the couple.
They're from Columbia originally and how they got to Omaha.
It provides a great detail of how the restaurant feels,
the nice, warm, inviting atmosphere the restaurant has, and then
(02:17):
Chris provides a delicious description of the food and drinks.
And then accompanying Chris's review are Jen's awesome photos. And
luckily I waited till after lunch to read this review
because I would have been starving by the time I
was done. To read Chris's review of this review or
all his reviews, you can go to girl Maha dot com,
click on reviews. There you'll see a button that says eats,
(02:40):
so click on eats and you'll find all Chris's reviews there.
Let's get into this week's News of the Week, sponsored
by Ego Mortgage. Eagle Mortgage Mortgage has been in business
for more than thirty years. Their license in Nebraska and Iowa.
They provide free consultations, they'll get you pre approved. They
do conventionalha They are located at the corner of one
(03:04):
hundred fourteenth in Dodge Street, or you can visit them
online at Eagle Mortgage Company dot com. So the first
item here on the News of the List is something
that Lou and I talk about all the time. We
both take pictures of it all the time. But the
Mutual of Omaha Tower, earlier this week they poured the
concrete for the forty first or fortieth floor, and then
they raised the forums up for the forty first floor.
(03:29):
Mutual Tower is now over six hundred feet on its
way to six hundred and seventy seven feet, and Lou
on the way here today. It's kind of smoky out there,
but I'm pretty sure I saw the concrete pump sitting
on top of the tower again today.
Speaker 3 (03:43):
Which is awesome. I mean, it's so incredible to watch
that building rise, and those of us who are members
of the High Obsessed Club, of which I'm a charter member,
can't be more excited to see a top out later
this year. I mean, as Brad said, we know it's
well over six hundred feet now. Really from different angles,
it's amazing how massive the base of that building is
(04:04):
going to be.
Speaker 2 (04:05):
And so for those of you that haven't been following
as close as we have, usually when the concrete pump,
it's a big arm that shows up on the top
of the tower. Usually when that shows up, the next
business day they pour concrete and then the following day
they raised the form. So you know, by Tuesday we
could be looking at a forty two floor tower, like
I said on the way to forty four. So we're
(04:25):
getting really close, you know. At this pace, they could
be full height by the end of.
Speaker 3 (04:29):
The month easily. With good our cameras ready and take
some more picks.
Speaker 2 (04:32):
Sounds good. Up next, Epley Airfield celebrated a historic milestone.
In June. The airport recorded five hundred and twenty four
three and thirty one passengers. That's a new all time record.
They beat the existing record, which was set last June
twenty twenty four, with five hundred and fourteen thousand. A
year to date, passenger traffic is still down three percent,
(04:54):
but it's great seeing another record breaking.
Speaker 3 (04:56):
You know, the good peak travel months coming up, so
that should help enhance the traffic flow as well.
Speaker 2 (05:02):
And the progress on the Epplice construction just keeps plugging away.
Every time I see a picture of that place that's
changed a little bit. Absolutely cannot wait to see the
finished product down there. Third item on our News of
the week, the city of Omaha City Council approved the
purchase of one hundred and twenty seven thousand dollars in
materials and equipment to repair the fountain at the base
(05:24):
of the Bobcarey Pedestrian Bridge on the Nebraska side. I
don't know, Lou if you remember that this was There
was a fountain there when it first opened, but then
it I don't know that it lasted more than a
couple of years.
Speaker 3 (05:35):
Yeah, it went away.
Speaker 2 (05:37):
That Bob carry Pedestrian Bridge is such a great asset
for our downtown and you can go there first thing
in the morning, late at night and there's just people
walking all over that thing.
Speaker 3 (05:49):
Yeah, it's a premium place for people to visit, whether
you live in the metro or whether you're coming in
from out of town. People flocked to that.
Speaker 2 (05:57):
The Hampton in Suites on Saddle Creek at Fourth in
Douglas Street that is now open. The six story hotel
has ninety six rooms located, like I said, right next
to the Med Center, managed by NH Hospitalities, and also
has all the normal hotel amenities such as a fitness center, breakfast,
(06:17):
event space. It's great seeing all the projects popping up
along that Med Center and.
Speaker 3 (06:24):
The development, I mean, over two billion dollars of development
in that corridor isn't impressive.
Speaker 2 (06:30):
So for our final news of the week, we're going
to bring on our first guests just a little bit early.
We'll give him a proper introduction here after the commercial break.
But Eric Miller. I've known Eric for a long time
and we have a mutual interest in railroads, and so
for this last news of the week item, I thought
i'd bring him on to discust. This week, it was
announced that Union Pacific has entered into late negotiations with
(06:54):
Norfolk Southern to merge. The combined network would have over
fifty thousand miles of track it cover forty three states.
Merger is set to be valued at eighty five billion dollars. Eric,
welcome back. What do you have to say about the merger?
Speaker 4 (07:09):
Yeah, thank you.
Speaker 5 (07:10):
Well, yeah, so this is something that I've been following
and it really impacts Omaha because obviously Union Pacific's headquartered here.
There's about four hundred forty thousand employees here in the
Omaha area, and so we've got our headquarters building downtown.
Now the headquarters building is only about sixty percent full.
You know, I'm hoping that there'll be some of transfer
(07:31):
of employees as the headquarters will stay here in Omaha.
Norfolk Southern has about three hundred and fifty thousand employees
in Atlanta. I don't expect all of them to come here,
but it'd be great if we get to even get
a few hundred. But yeah, so so big impact here
here with Omaha. I note that this is basically the
United States first and like coast to coast of trans
(07:53):
continental network now with just one railroad.
Speaker 4 (07:56):
Obviously we've we've.
Speaker 5 (07:57):
Completed the trans continental over a long time ago, but
you know you can go and in with just one railroad.
And obviously we have through running trains and locomotive pooling
agreements now that so you know, they'll be through trains
from LA to New York, for example, but now we'll
just be able to do it with one railroad. Make
that in a little bit simpler newsier. So I think
it's going to be a great merger that'll effect you know,
(08:19):
not only the nation, but also here locally in Oman.
Speaker 2 (08:22):
Yeah, and this merger is a long way for being done.
It has to go through all the regulatory approvals and everything. Now,
so you're going to see this merger in the news
for quite a while to come. Well, that's the end
of our News of the Week sponsored by Ego Mortgage.
We're going to take our first commercial break, and when
we come back, we're going to talk about the Omaha
(08:43):
Streetcar with Eric Miller, streetcar Operations Manager for the City
of Omaha. Here listening to Grow Omaha, brought to you
by Dingman's Closion Center along with Cheer Athletics. We'll be
right back after this on news Radio eleven ten kfa
B and welcome back to the show. We're brought to
you by Cheer Athletic and Dingman's Colosion Center. Cheer Athletic
is the nation's number one all star cheer gym. For
(09:06):
more details, check out Caomaha dot com. Jeff and Trent
and have the weekend off. I'm Brad Williams sitting next
to me as LUs Hicanos, and we're going to bring
our first guest of the day, actually our only guest
of the day. Today, we're joined by Eric Miller, streetcar
Operations Manager for the City of Omaha. Eric, Welcome back
to the show.
Speaker 4 (09:25):
Thanks good to be here.
Speaker 5 (09:26):
I was here in person a couple of years ago,
and then last December when we had the freezing ice,
I called in.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
Yeah, I remember that. It was a little tricky getting here.
I was on that day too, So well, since you
were on last you have a new role. You have
actually accepted the job and started as the City of
Omaha Streetcar Operations manager. You want to tell us a
little bit about your new role.
Speaker 5 (09:47):
Yeah, sure, So I've been doing this for about two
months now, pretty new, and it continues some of the
work I was doing as a consultant before. So basically
I am full time on the streetcar helping set up
our operations. We'll be in charge of service as we
get that, and also helping with obviously a communications effort
we've got letting people know about the streetcar and what
it's going to look like, and then also helping It's
(10:11):
basically a role that's helping the Omaha street Car Authority
because they are the designated agency that is running this
whole thing.
Speaker 2 (10:20):
So you know, besides you running the street car in
the city having a lot of control of that, you're
also going to have a private operations company. You want
to tell us little bit about that.
Speaker 5 (10:30):
Yeah, sure, So a lot of streetcar systems, especially in
cities where you don't already have a robust rail transit network,
will hire a private operator. So similar to what Kansas
City did, Oklahoma City, Cincinnati, Milwaukee, and so we have
a public RFP out right now that closes on September tenth.
Speaker 4 (10:47):
For a private operator.
Speaker 5 (10:49):
We've got four companies that are interested, and then we'll
look to select somebody this fall.
Speaker 4 (10:54):
And so that's going really well.
Speaker 5 (10:56):
And so basically they'll come in and they'll they will
hire all the operators, supervisors and mechanics to run the system.
Speaker 4 (11:03):
So, yeah, really excited about that. Progress is going well
on that.
Speaker 3 (11:07):
It's an exciting development overall in terms of the service
that will provide and times it's running. Let's talk a
little bit about the frequency. I know that first of all,
it's free, so nobody has to pay for it, correct, right, Yeah,
I like to say zero fair, right, and I love that.
And then the frequency, from what I understand is during
(11:28):
peak hours between ten am and seven pm during a
week it'll run in ten minute routes. Service routes every
ten minutes, and then off peak it'll be fifteen minutes.
And then on the weekends it it'll be twenty minutes.
Speaker 5 (11:44):
Yeah, and even on Saturdays and Sundays, we'll still have
a little like kind of midday. Most of day will
be ten every ten minutes.
Speaker 3 (11:50):
Right, and the hours of operation we're looking at her
six am until midnight, and then on the weekends on
Friday and Saturdays, it goes till two in the morning. Right.
Speaker 4 (12:00):
Yeah, that's the plan right now.
Speaker 5 (12:01):
And then obviously as we start running and see what
the ridership looks like, we can make adjustments.
Speaker 4 (12:05):
But yeah, that's what we're planning right now.
Speaker 3 (12:07):
Well, that's awesome. And again it's free, folks. You can't
get better than free. One of the things that when
I study the streetcar, one of the things if you
go to the website and read up on it, it's
amazing that you could see since the nineteen sixties the
city has basically replaced businesses with surface parking. Over fifty
(12:29):
percent in the Omaha City core is committed to surface parking,
and about fifty percent of those service those lots are empty.
Speaker 4 (12:37):
They're not being raced. Yeah.
Speaker 5 (12:38):
Yeah, and have you noticed as you walk through downtown
there's a lot of those surface lots that are locked.
Speaker 4 (12:42):
Up and closed.
Speaker 5 (12:43):
And I don't know what people are doing with that,
but yeah, let's activate those exactly.
Speaker 3 (12:47):
So the city has a very ambitious and I think
very realistic plan of adding thirty thousand jobs, you know,
and also thirty thousand residents to the downtown core or
core area population. And one of the benefits of having
a streetcar is the development that it can spur. Right now,
the estimate is it's going to spur nearly four billion
(13:10):
dollars of development along that line.
Speaker 5 (13:12):
Yep, Yeah, that's right. Yeah, and we're we're on track
ahead of that pace. So it's it's looking really good.
We've got a lot of exciting projects as as we
talk about on this show and so so, yeah, a
lot of cool stuff coming out of this.
Speaker 2 (13:24):
You know, we've just discussed how this benefits people in
the urban core, but what we get a lot of
people on the like the gro Omaha social media and stuff.
They always they always say, well, how does this benefit
us that live out west or how those benefit us
that don't go downtown. And you know, I got an
opinion that we have a lot of things in this
town that don't benefit everyone. You know, we have golf
(13:46):
courses and there's a lot of people that don't golf.
We have swimming pools, and we not everyone swims. We
have you know, libraries, not everyone reads. We have things.
It's more of like a complete package. We got to
have something for everyone in the streetcar will benefit a
ton of people. What's your opinion? What's your answer to that?
When you get people in West Omaha that say, I
(14:06):
never go downtown and this is dumb and I'm never
gonna come right it? Sure?
Speaker 5 (14:09):
Yeah, well I love that question because I live out
in Nocorn, so I'm kind of one of those good
labeled me as a West Omaha skeptic.
Speaker 4 (14:15):
But no, I think this is this is something that
will impact the region.
Speaker 5 (14:18):
I mean, it's similar in scope and size to our Zoo,
the Riverfront Park, the Chi Center. Even if you don't
use it, it's going to have those ripple effects of
making our city and our region better. And then also
even if if you're not like living or working downtown
or midtown, not using it every day, you might still
come downtown a few times a year, you know, like
I take my family down down in these places downtown
(14:40):
and the Zoo a few times a year, and it's great.
I mean, it's one of the benefits of living in Omaha,
and so I know the streetcar will be one of
those benefits of living in Omaha.
Speaker 4 (14:48):
And yeah, and excited.
Speaker 5 (14:49):
And also I want to mention that we're working this
into being part of the transit network and so you know,
it's it's not going to be in a vacuum, and
so you will be able to connect to it from
other trans modes and from other parts of the city
even if you don't want to drive, you know.
Speaker 2 (15:03):
And today would be a perfect example of what would
a good streetcar day would be Tonight all day Actually,
we have the Maha Music Festival in downtown Omaha. There's
not a ton of parking around that part of downtown
for the size of the crowd that that's going to generate.
And then also you're going to have people that are
going to like some bands not like other bands. And
(15:24):
so when the street car is active, people could take,
you know, they go to Midtown, eat lunch somewhere in
midtown Midtown Crossing or the Blackstone Hop. On the street car.
They could go down see a band or two that
they like, and then get right back out of there
and then come back later for maybe the headliner or something,
so there'd be opportunity to get in and out of
downtown quickly without trying to find a place to park
(15:46):
two three times.
Speaker 4 (15:47):
Yeah, yeah, definitely, exactly.
Speaker 5 (15:49):
And I also want to note that, so we're planning
to run four vehicles at the same time. During the peak,
we will have a fleet of up to six, so
I'm hoping that, you know, as long as as we
have our maintenance and they're in good shape, we might
be able to put an extra one in there and
run a little extra service on some of these special
event days, you know, like the event today or Jazz
on the Green or holiday lights and that sort of thing.
Speaker 3 (16:09):
Well, that that's and that this speaks to Brad's question too,
So in terms of the route and where it's going
to be running. So we're starting on eighth Street, looping
to tenth on Farnaman Harney, and it'll go all the
way out to Midtown crossing and into the Blackstone District
around thirty ninth Street, So that that would be the
route that we're running continuously.
Speaker 4 (16:31):
Yeah, yeah, for now.
Speaker 5 (16:32):
Initially, you're still working on trying to get this, especially
trying to get that UNMC segment done, like we initially
intended it to be of for example.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
But yeah, you know and Di Minutgo, you said we
were gonna be running four street cars at a time,
you'll have six. Have those been picked out or purchased ordered?
Speaker 4 (16:51):
Yeah, good question.
Speaker 5 (16:52):
So we entered into a notice to proceed with the
manufacturer acronym of c AF or CALF. They're headquartered in Spain.
They do make vehicles here in the United States and
so ours are. They're not quite under construction yet. We're
still sourcing all the parts, but they will be built
in Spain. And the timeline for those is we should
get our first vehicle here within about two years, so
kind of mid twenty twenty seven, and then they should
(17:14):
start coming in at a frequency of about once a month.
Speaker 3 (17:17):
And we have a storage facility currently under construction.
Speaker 5 (17:20):
Right yeah, yeah, our vehicle maintenance facility is being built
right now. Samson is the lead constructor on that. They
also built the Kawasaki plant and Lincoln. They're bas in Lincoln,
and so so yeah, that's going really well. It's started
under construction back in April. You can go down and
check it out. It's really close to the park that's
just south of the Luminarium and just north of where
(17:41):
the new Children's Museum will be.
Speaker 2 (17:43):
Yeah, if you park at the Luminarium and on the
west side of that parking, now there's a bike trail.
Just walk down the bike trail a little bit to
the south and you'll be able to see where the
streetcar facility is going. Right now, it looks like about
two hundred pipes pounded in the ground and they've.
Speaker 4 (17:56):
Been foundations going in.
Speaker 5 (17:59):
But yeah, a great view of it there. And also
the skyline right behind there. You know that I for
eighty is a little bit of an icere, but but yeah,
a good view of it there.
Speaker 2 (18:06):
All right, Well, we're gonna take our middle of the
show break and when we come back, it'll be time
for our Not a Company Spotlight Project Spotlight. You've been
listening to Groa Maha brought to you by Dingman's Closion
Center and Cheer Athletics. We'll be right back after this
on news Radio eleven ten KFAB and welcome back to
Girl Maha. We're brought to you by Cheer Athletic and
(18:28):
Dingman's Collision Center. Dingman's Closion Center is a family owned
autobody shop with four metro locations and they do mechanical
repair as well well. Now it's time for our not
A Companies development spotlight. Not A Companies is a Omaha
based full service real estate company. They can be reached
at not alcmpanies dot com. So our spotlight for not
(18:51):
this week is on a piece of ground they own
out on the west end of Village Point Village Point
West and is H and H Kia. This week, H
and H Kia broke ground on a new car dealership
on nine point seven seven acres between Walgreens and Core
Bank on the southeast side of one hundred and eightieth
and Burke Street in the Village Point West. The Kia
(19:14):
dealership will include sales and service and enough space for
six hundred cars on site. Construction should be complete at
the end of twenty twenty six. Kia has a current
dealership and papillion on the north the east corner of
Highway fifty and three seventy. So, Lou, what's your favorite
not all companies development?
Speaker 3 (19:34):
Man, there's so many great ones to talk about. I
love what they've done in Builders District Headquarter, you know,
spearheaded by the key Keyweit World Headquarters and you know,
they have a timber building that's a kind of a
business building there, and some also residential. But I think
probably out of all of them, my favorite has to
(19:54):
be Exorban Village. It's such an inviting masterpiece of what
her great urban infilm mixed use development can be. Being
old enough to remember what that area used to be
back in the day it was a race track and
Exarbon call CEM and now to see it actually be
an urban infoll success story, I can't tell you. I
(20:16):
bring people in from out of town and to that
particular area and they're always amazed by it.
Speaker 2 (20:21):
Yeah, Exarbon Village is definitely awesome. My favorite, though, is
the River's Edge over in Council Blast because it has
some of the best views of the Omaha skyline.
Speaker 3 (20:32):
That's premium right there.
Speaker 2 (20:34):
So let's get back to our conversation with Eric Miller.
Eric is the streetcar operations manager for this city of Omaha.
So Eric construction is already underway. We talked about it
a little bit before the commercial break that the streetcar
barn is underway, but there is other pieces of the
construction underway. I noticed today on the way down here
that the crews are pouring the concrete deck on the
(20:57):
Harney Street Bridge, which will be one of the first
pieces of the project to be completed.
Speaker 3 (21:04):
Right.
Speaker 5 (21:04):
Yeah, that's super exciting because that project is a little
head of schedule right now, so that's great. And you'll
notice the rails aren't going in on the bridge yet.
Those will come in next year. But then when we
get to Farnham, which will which is right now is
a plan to start construction turn that down in January
twenty twenty six. Those that'll that'll go in with the
(21:25):
rails in there because of your land track next year.
Speaker 2 (21:28):
And you know why you can't while the rails are
not going in, you can actually see you could see
they were forming the bridge differently where the rails are
going to be, so if you wanted to see, you know,
kind of a preview shot. I think if Jeff hasn't
posted it on the girl Maha facebook page yet, I'm
going to get that picture posted up soon. Also, I
(21:48):
was driving through the Blackstone district today and they were
actually removing the old historic street car rails to work
on the utilities. The utility infrastructure it needs to be
improved before the new street tracks to go in, so
it was kind of cool to see the old the
old rusty rails they're sitting in the middle of Farm Street.
Speaker 4 (22:06):
Yeah right, yeah.
Speaker 5 (22:07):
A lot of times, you know, when after the streetcar
service ended, which ended over on March fourth, nineteen fifty five,
a lot of times the cruiser's coming and just poor
asphalt right over the old brick and rails.
Speaker 4 (22:17):
And so as you dig that up, you can see it.
Speaker 5 (22:18):
And sometimes in a lot of areas where the street
car used to run, you can see the cracks and
the asphalt where the rails.
Speaker 2 (22:24):
Still are still are they just kind of pushing the
asshalt up a little higher than the surrounding pavement. So
what's next with the streetcar?
Speaker 5 (22:32):
Okay, so right now you'll notice, you know, all along
Farnam and Harney, we got a lot of utility work
going on. Officially, Hawkins is in charge of the utility.
It's called Utilities West, which is west the for Eity Bridge,
and then we're starting on what's called Utilities East, which
will be in more there's we've already done some work downtown.
We'll do more work in the downtown area. And then
also the one contract that we haven't awarded yet is
(22:55):
the utilities for turn of Boulevard. Turn a Boulevard is
an interesting place because that's where the track goes from
double track on Farnham to splitting on Farnham and Harney.
And then we've also got what's called a y in
there and so you'll be able to turn streetcars kind
of halfway through if you need to, if we have
to do any kind of short terms or service disruptions.
Are also special events, so that'll be coming up. And
(23:18):
then we also just recently awarded Keywit for the overall
track construction for the whole main line, So all that's
going on in addition to the maintenance facility that I
talked about earlier.
Speaker 4 (23:28):
Those are our big projects.
Speaker 3 (23:30):
Wow, that's a lot going on now. We know there
was a new estimate for the cost overall now at
four hundred and twenty one million, and that was just
earlier last month. I believe it's like thirty days ago.
And we've got a new mayor. We've had a good
transition from the previous administration to the new one and
our new Mayor Ewing seems to be completely on board
(23:52):
and wanting to even enhance the development of the streetcar.
Let's talk a little bit about the future. Where do
we see it going.
Speaker 5 (24:01):
Yeah, sure, so as we get closer to opening this one,
and then as we open it, we'll see how successful
it is, and then I think there'll be you know,
more demand for extensions, So we're trying to get ready
for that. Obviously, we've we've got a couple of studies
that are going on already. City of Council Bluffs has
kind of taking it on themselves to do do studies,
and they're on a kind of a preliminary environmental study
right now that should be wrapping up end of this year,
(24:23):
maybe early next year. Waiting for some updated travel demand
modeling from from the regional UH government agency here, but
that that planning is going well. We've also got federal
funding for an extension looking north of downtown, so hoping
to get that study started maybe later this year. But
(24:44):
there's also some other obvious, you know areas as I
mentioned earlier, Getting that un MC extension is a big
deal that could continue further west, you know, through Saddle
Creek and Xarbon for example. That might be a solid extension.
There's other other quarridors north that you could look into.
And then obviously south that was part of the original
like late nineties tenth Street trolleys go to the Zoo,
(25:07):
that could go down tenth or thirteenth Street, take advantage
of some of the new development and other development potential,
and connecting one of our big tourist attractions down there.
Speaker 3 (25:16):
All right, absolutely, I mean, we know the Zoo is
the number one tourist attraction in the state of Nebraska,
so it makes perfect sense to have that connectivity with
the streetcar. And again, can't overemphasize we talked earlier about
the amount of development that along the streetcar line, that
this can spur nearly four billion dollars, and all of
that can be cultural amenities, business, mixed use, residential. It's
(25:41):
not just happened. It's not just something we're talking about
that could happen in Omaha currently is and it has
happened in other cities like Kansas City, right.
Speaker 4 (25:51):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (25:51):
Another thing I'm excited about is the potential for a
south extension is connecting Amtrak and future you know, commuter
rail to Lincoln and other other points like that.
Speaker 2 (26:00):
So, so, how far along or down the road do
you see some of these exits? Are we talking like
a five year plan or like a twenty year plan.
Speaker 4 (26:09):
You know, it could go either way.
Speaker 5 (26:10):
I think it really depends on on again how successful
the starter line is, which wire working really hard to
make it that way, and then and then also depends
on you know, we find champions community support for each
each corridor. There's also some obviously organizational structure that needs
to be adjusted with Metro or Metro transit, and.
Speaker 4 (26:33):
But but also just just yeah, figuring out.
Speaker 5 (26:35):
And so if you look at other cities, things are
fairly quick, like so Kansas City Streetcar open nine years
ago and they're opening their first two extensions this year,
so it took them about nine years.
Speaker 3 (26:45):
You know.
Speaker 5 (26:45):
The other places, if we do incremental extensions, like like
Portland Streetcar did, might only be five years. So it
kind of varies, you know, the the amount of the extension,
the support and the funding.
Speaker 3 (26:56):
For it, and the the initial line. I know we
will be testing it in twenty twenty seven into twenty
twenty eight, and then we'd be online by twenty twenty eight.
Speaker 4 (27:07):
Yeah, yeah, that's right.
Speaker 5 (27:08):
So yeah, we're mid twenty twenty eight still a good
estimate right now. So as we stay stay on schedule
with this stuff. But yeah, it'll be really important that
that we keep keep going on all these on all
these cylinders in extra years.
Speaker 2 (27:22):
You know, we're kind of going back a little bit here,
But when where did the where's the east end terminating?
Is it in front of CHI or is it down
by the baseball stadium more.
Speaker 5 (27:32):
Yeah, there'll be a stop just east of tenth Street
on Capitol Avenue and so just south of CHI and
then that's where it does its loop around down to
eighth Street. And then there'll be a stop right across
the Children's Museum really close to the Orbit stop there.
That's an area where that I see as a potential
future multimodal hub or mobility hub or you can have
transfers to different other different multimodal and bike sharing that
(27:54):
sort of thing.
Speaker 2 (27:55):
So when this is all online and running for the
cultural series, that people will get off at ten in
Capitol and then walk down the hill too.
Speaker 5 (28:03):
Yeah, and then that could be like talking about incremental extensions,
that could be one where you go north a couple
of blocks or whatever.
Speaker 2 (28:09):
Yeah, and you've been on this show before and talked
about how an extension to the airport is not really
a feasible extension, at least not in the initial plans.
Speaker 4 (28:20):
Obly not for a street car.
Speaker 5 (28:21):
If you're looking at having stops every three to four blocks,
that'd be a really slow way to get there.
Speaker 2 (28:25):
Yeah, But when you're talking like we talked about the
Zoo earlier, that seems to me like that's a no
brainer corridor.
Speaker 4 (28:32):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (28:32):
I mean, the way Thirteenth Street is blown up over
the last few years, you could have a couple stops
on there, and that could be even a more thriving
neighborhood than it already.
Speaker 4 (28:42):
Is, right, Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 3 (28:44):
Yeah, Yeah, we were talking about bred and I had
a conversation about this the other day about how, okay,
if we were going to go streetcar to the Zoo,
what would be the best street to go. Would it
be Thirteenth Street or Tenth Street? Yeah, you know, Thirteenth Street.
We know we've got the the district there that's you know,
kind of blowing up a little bit. And then you
got a little Italy along seventh to tenth. You got
(29:08):
little Bohemia there on Thirteenth, So you know, it's it's
kind of speculation, but both I could I could see
both being feasible.
Speaker 5 (29:16):
Yeah, totally. Yeah, that's why I think we need to
study it more. Both were a historic streetcar corridor. Its
interestingly enough, service stopped running on Thirteenth Street in nineteen
thirty six because they did a pavement project, and some
services on ten Street until nineteen fifty five.
Speaker 3 (29:31):
So, you know, it's funny. When I was a kid,
I used to hear my mother talk about how she
used to ride the streetcar, you know, and she grew
up in an area around twenty fourth and Mason Street,
and streetcar ran right down there, and it used to
go north to south, south to north, and I used
to hear stories. And now that we talk about the
streetcar today, potential for it and well the fact that
(29:52):
it is going to open in twenty twenty eight, it's
exciting to me.
Speaker 4 (29:55):
Yeah, totally.
Speaker 2 (29:56):
Well, Eric, we always appreciate you joining us. You provide
so much of able insight on this subject. I know
there's still a lot of haters out there on the
street car, but I think with constant education and you know,
reminding people that, you know, it's part of a complete
city and we need, you know, we talk about brain
drain and keeping the younger people here. We talk about
being complete. This is just one piece of the puzzle
(30:18):
to have a complete city. So yeah, hopefully everyone's on board.
It's still not costing anyone a dollar out of their
taxes because it's completely funded by TIFF. So thanks for
coming on and talking about all this again and can't
wait to have you back hopefully soon and hopefully you
have more cool stuff to tell us.
Speaker 4 (30:35):
Yeah. Thanks.
Speaker 5 (30:36):
I want to give a quick shout out to We
have a live webinar the first Wednesday of the month
at noon if you want to learn more about it,
So first Wednesday of the month at noon, and it's
on YouTube our Omaha street Car YouTube channel and go
to Omaha streetcard dot org if you want to send
in a question for us.
Speaker 2 (30:52):
So, the Omaha street Car has their own dedicated YouTube channel.
Speaker 4 (30:55):
Ye okay, yeah, research Omaha street Car Authority. You'll find
it great.
Speaker 2 (30:58):
I did not know that. All right, when we come back,
it's time for the Perkins Christer Construction Lightning Round. You're
listening to grol Maha, brought to you by Deemon's Collision
Center along with Cheer Athletics. We'll be back right after
this on news Radio eleven ten KFAB and Welcome back
to the Gromha Show. We're brought to you by Cheer
Athletics and Demon's Collision Center. It's now time for the
(31:20):
Lightning Round, brought to you by Perkins christ Construction. Perkins
Christer is a full service class a general contractor based
in Omaha and Lincoln and Council Bluffs surrounding areas. Are
based in Omaha, serving the surrounding areas. Their experienced construction
team of project managers, project administrator, superintendent's, carpenters and labors,
(31:41):
many with over thirty years experience. If you need more information,
see their website at pcconstruction dot com. Well, I have
a new item here that was not on the script
I sent you Lou this morning. When I was on
my way to studio. The Dollar Store at thirty fifth
and level Worth is on a big hole in the
(32:01):
ground with a pile rubbel in it. This is going
to be redeveloped into another nice looking apartment building along
the Levenworth Street corridor. The Elevenworth Street corridor has really
blown up in the last few years.
Speaker 4 (32:14):
Oh totally.
Speaker 3 (32:14):
I used to live in that neck of the woods
and that Dollar General store was there even in the
nineties when I was living there, and it's so great
to see the new construction in that area. It's needed.
Speaker 2 (32:24):
Yeah. So last year the Cosgrove Apartment, it's a beautiful
brick building open just to the west of it. And
then this year there's another smaller apartment on thirty six
and Level war So this would just be another building
the cap.
Speaker 3 (32:37):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (32:39):
So Hyper Energy Bar, a beverage chain from Urbandale, Iowa,
is planning to open two locations in West Omha. The
first one, a nine hundred square foot building on the
southwest corner of one hundred eightieth and West Maple Road,
is now under construction. The second will be a double
drive through building on one hundred eightieth and Burke Street
west of Village Point. Construction on the second will start
(33:00):
in early December, with the planned opening in January. Hyper
currently has seven locations, six in the Des Moines, Iowa area,
and one in Iowa City.
Speaker 3 (33:11):
And the disclaimer is you don't buy energy bars there.
It's an actual bar bar all right up.
Speaker 2 (33:16):
Next yesterday Smoking Barrel Barbecue opened their brand new location
on one hundred and eightieth Street. This is just north
to center. You got that strip mall there with a
lighthouse bar and there was an Asian restaurant. This replaced
a firehouse subs location. I know, Lou, you are like
(33:37):
me and Jeff and a lot of people. Barbecue is
one of your favorites.
Speaker 3 (33:41):
Oh yeah, and since this one is really close to
my residence area, I can literally walk there. I love barbecue.
Love having another option, So.
Speaker 2 (33:50):
This will be a lot more of a visible location.
Their previous location was down in Millard, kind of off
behind that old Baker's down there by the Millard Airport.
We do have a little bit of bad news. Chicken
and Pickle, which everyone was excited was going to open
at one hundred and twenty th and fort and they
are no longer going to open a Nebraska location. They
(34:11):
said that they changing their shift in strategic growth and
they're going to focus on their existing locations. This is
going to be the first year in many years that
they have not opened a new location.
Speaker 4 (34:22):
Yep.
Speaker 3 (34:22):
I had read an article about that they're kind of
taking putting the brakes on and kind of digesting I
guess a little bit.
Speaker 2 (34:30):
Yeah, Chicken and Pickle down in Kansas City, it's a
really cool looking place. It's going to be a neat
addition to Omaha. Hopefully they find something else kind of
cool in that area. We do have like Blue Sky here,
which I really enjoyed. Definitely tasty pizza, which is a
favorite of my kids. By the way, will open a
new restaurant at fourteen twenty one North Salad Creek Road
(34:53):
near Sergeant Peffer's Italian. Construction is expected to be complete
in the fall of twenty twenty six the local. It
currently operates in the former gas station, but plans to
upgrade the space to more efficient kitchen and drive through
carry out orders. According to the City Clerk's office, Oma
has some great pizza and this is just another one,
(35:13):
you know, we we sure do.
Speaker 3 (35:15):
And the development in that area just keeps coming. Yeah,
love seeing it.
Speaker 2 (35:19):
That whole There's there's a ton of untapped potential too
in that whole Saddle Creek in Northwest Radial area totally
Keydoba Mexican Eats opened its new Elkhorn store late last
week in the former Oklahoma Joe's Barbecue space fourteen oh
five South two hundred and fourth Street. Oklahoma Joe's closed
their restaurant several months ago, but continues to operate the
(35:40):
store at Exarbon Village, Kidoba now has eleven metro area locations.
Speaker 3 (35:45):
Another person that frequents ke Dooba. You know, it's good
to see that option come up. It's a decent alternative
to the traditional fast food.
Speaker 2 (35:55):
Well, Lou, I really appreciate you joining me today. It's great.
You know, like you said, we do this off the
air all the time. But what are you also excited
to see things that we didn't cover? What else is
going on? Omaha? Are you excited to see coming up
in the next year?
Speaker 3 (36:13):
I think in it again, I echo the same. This
is like you and I having a conversation that we
have together, and you know, I'm really excited to see
the area and the development. Also with the new library
coming up, you know that's going to be opening up
next year, along with the crossroads development. I think all
that every time I drive by there. I think, man,
(36:35):
I picture what it's going to look like once it
gets done, and how incredible that whole seventy second Street
and Dodge area is going to look like. So that's
one thing that I'm excited about. I'm also big and
bullish on the core, so talking about development in north downtown,
talking about development along the new park system, along the
streetcar route. All of those things just get the juices
(36:57):
flowing for me. You know.
Speaker 2 (36:59):
The library put out a new video just sometime in
the last two weeks on their Facebook page kind of
going over the whole plan for it, and it's going
to have so many more features than just you know,
you think traditional library books and magazines, but this everything
from a cafe to the dou space three D print
lab is going to have so many great things in there.
(37:21):
And it's a pretty awesome looking building when you drive
buy on Saturday Second Street.
Speaker 3 (37:24):
It's going to be absolutely beautiful. And one other thing
too that I'm excited about is the airport.
Speaker 2 (37:30):
Oh yeah, they can't wait for the airport, get that.
And you know at our airport, what we never had
before is going to have a lounge ship for a
lounge up on the third floor, which is awesome. Well again,
thanks for joining us. You've been listening to the Girl
Maha Show. We'll be back next Saturday morning at nine
am right here on news Radio eleven ten KFAB
This is Grow Omaha, the only radio show that talks
about economic development, construction, business expansion, and all of those
things that make Omaha a great place to live or visit.
Grow Omaha on News Radio eleven ten K.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
Baby, Well, good morning, and welcome to Grow Omaha, the
only show that talks about the growth, development, construction, restaurants,
and all things that make our city a great place
to live. We'd like to thank our sponsors Cheer Athletics,
the nation's number one all star Cheerjim, along with Dingman's
Collision Center, who has four metro locations taking care of
(00:34):
autobody needs and even some mechanical repairs. Trenton and Jeff
have the weekend off, so filling in today. I'm Brad Williams.
I'm a member of the planning team at e and
a consulting group, and I'm also the owner of Brad
Williams Photography. Sitting next to me, my co host today,
is a guy that you've heard on these airwaves before,
but it's been nearly twelve years since he's been here.
(00:56):
Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to the show hallus Chicanos.
Speaker 3 (00:59):
We thank you, Brad. It's fantastic to be back. I've
known Jeff and Trenton for over twenty years and the
same with you, and I'm welcoming the return. It's great
to be back in studio with everybody.
Speaker 2 (01:13):
So even though Lou hasn't joined us for a long time,
he meets with Jeff almost monthly, and Lou and I
get together and talk about all the things going on
in this city almost about every other week, twice a month, probably,
so why he hasn't been here, He's been close to
us this whole time. And one more thing, Lou, happy birthday.
You celebrated a birthday yesterday. Well, thank you, my friend.
(01:35):
I don't know if I'm the year wiser, but I
know I'm the year older, all right. We have a
new grow Omaha Eats restaurant review this week Chris Corey
and his wife Jen. They do a restaurant review every
other week. That review is sponsored by All Makes Office Equipment,
located at twenty fifth and Farham Street. This week, Chris
(01:55):
and Jen review Cumbia on sixteenth Street, located just north
of the Orpheum Theater right next door to Mercury. Chris's
review does a great job telling the story about the couple.
They're from Columbia originally and how they got to Omaha.
It provides a great detail of how the restaurant feels,
the nice, warm, inviting atmosphere the restaurant has, and then
(02:17):
Chris provides a delicious description of the food and drinks.
And then accompanying Chris's review are Jen's awesome photos. And
luckily I waited till after lunch to read this review
because I would have been starving by the time I
was done. To read Chris's review of this review or
all his reviews, you can go to girl Maha dot com,
click on reviews. There you'll see a button that says eats,
(02:40):
so click on eats and you'll find all Chris's reviews there.
Let's get into this week's News of the Week, sponsored
by Ego Mortgage. Eagle Mortgage Mortgage has been in business
for more than thirty years. Their license in Nebraska and Iowa.
They provide free consultations, they'll get you pre approved. They
do conventionalha They are located at the corner of one
(03:04):
hundred fourteenth in Dodge Street, or you can visit them
online at Eagle Mortgage Company dot com. So the first
item here on the News of the List is something
that Lou and I talk about all the time. We
both take pictures of it all the time. But the
Mutual of Omaha Tower, earlier this week they poured the
concrete for the forty first or fortieth floor, and then
they raised the forums up for the forty first floor.
(03:29):
Mutual Tower is now over six hundred feet on its
way to six hundred and seventy seven feet, and Lou
on the way here today. It's kind of smoky out there,
but I'm pretty sure I saw the concrete pump sitting
on top of the tower again today.
Speaker 3 (03:43):
Which is awesome. I mean, it's so incredible to watch
that building rise, and those of us who are members
of the High Obsessed Club, of which I'm a charter member,
can't be more excited to see a top out later
this year. I mean, as Brad said, we know it's
well over six hundred feet now. Really from different angles,
it's amazing how massive the base of that building is
(04:04):
going to be.
Speaker 2 (04:05):
And so for those of you that haven't been following
as close as we have, usually when the concrete pump,
it's a big arm that shows up on the top
of the tower. Usually when that shows up, the next
business day they pour concrete and then the following day
they raised the form. So you know, by Tuesday we
could be looking at a forty two floor tower, like
I said on the way to forty four. So we're
(04:25):
getting really close, you know. At this pace, they could
be full height by the end of.
Speaker 3 (04:29):
The month easily. With good our cameras ready and take
some more picks.
Speaker 2 (04:32):
Sounds good. Up next, Epley Airfield celebrated a historic milestone.
In June. The airport recorded five hundred and twenty four
three and thirty one passengers. That's a new all time record.
They beat the existing record, which was set last June
twenty twenty four, with five hundred and fourteen thousand. A
year to date, passenger traffic is still down three percent,
(04:54):
but it's great seeing another record breaking.
Speaker 3 (04:56):
You know, the good peak travel months coming up, so
that should help enhance the traffic flow as well.
Speaker 2 (05:02):
And the progress on the Epplice construction just keeps plugging away.
Every time I see a picture of that place that's
changed a little bit. Absolutely cannot wait to see the
finished product down there. Third item on our News of
the week, the city of Omaha City Council approved the
purchase of one hundred and twenty seven thousand dollars in
materials and equipment to repair the fountain at the base
(05:24):
of the Bobcarey Pedestrian Bridge on the Nebraska side. I
don't know, Lou if you remember that this was There
was a fountain there when it first opened, but then
it I don't know that it lasted more than a
couple of years.
Speaker 3 (05:35):
Yeah, it went away.
Speaker 2 (05:37):
That Bob carry Pedestrian Bridge is such a great asset
for our downtown and you can go there first thing
in the morning, late at night and there's just people
walking all over that thing.
Speaker 3 (05:49):
Yeah, it's a premium place for people to visit, whether
you live in the metro or whether you're coming in
from out of town. People flocked to that.
Speaker 2 (05:57):
The Hampton in Suites on Saddle Creek at Fourth in
Douglas Street that is now open. The six story hotel
has ninety six rooms located, like I said, right next
to the Med Center, managed by NH Hospitalities, and also
has all the normal hotel amenities such as a fitness center, breakfast,
(06:17):
event space. It's great seeing all the projects popping up
along that Med Center and.
Speaker 3 (06:24):
The development, I mean, over two billion dollars of development
in that corridor isn't impressive.
Speaker 2 (06:30):
So for our final news of the week, we're going
to bring on our first guests just a little bit early.
We'll give him a proper introduction here after the commercial break.
But Eric Miller. I've known Eric for a long time
and we have a mutual interest in railroads, and so
for this last news of the week item, I thought
i'd bring him on to discust. This week, it was
announced that Union Pacific has entered into late negotiations with
(06:54):
Norfolk Southern to merge. The combined network would have over
fifty thousand miles of track it cover forty three states.
Merger is set to be valued at eighty five billion dollars. Eric,
welcome back. What do you have to say about the merger?
Speaker 4 (07:09):
Yeah, thank you.
Speaker 5 (07:10):
Well, yeah, so this is something that I've been following
and it really impacts Omaha because obviously Union Pacific's headquartered here.
There's about four hundred forty thousand employees here in the
Omaha area, and so we've got our headquarters building downtown.
Now the headquarters building is only about sixty percent full.
You know, I'm hoping that there'll be some of transfer
(07:31):
of employees as the headquarters will stay here in Omaha.
Norfolk Southern has about three hundred and fifty thousand employees
in Atlanta. I don't expect all of them to come here,
but it'd be great if we get to even get
a few hundred. But yeah, so so big impact here
here with Omaha. I note that this is basically the
United States first and like coast to coast of trans
(07:53):
continental network now with just one railroad.
Speaker 4 (07:56):
Obviously we've we've.
Speaker 5 (07:57):
Completed the trans continental over a long time ago, but
you know you can go and in with just one railroad.
And obviously we have through running trains and locomotive pooling
agreements now that so you know, they'll be through trains
from LA to New York, for example, but now we'll
just be able to do it with one railroad. Make
that in a little bit simpler newsier. So I think
it's going to be a great merger that'll effect you know,
(08:19):
not only the nation, but also here locally in Oman.
Speaker 2 (08:22):
Yeah, and this merger is a long way for being done.
It has to go through all the regulatory approvals and everything. Now,
so you're going to see this merger in the news
for quite a while to come. Well, that's the end
of our News of the Week sponsored by Ego Mortgage.
We're going to take our first commercial break, and when
we come back, we're going to talk about the Omaha
(08:43):
Streetcar with Eric Miller, streetcar Operations Manager for the City
of Omaha. Here listening to Grow Omaha, brought to you
by Dingman's Closion Center along with Cheer Athletics. We'll be
right back after this on news Radio eleven ten kfa
B and welcome back to the show. We're brought to
you by Cheer Athletic and Dingman's Colosion Center. Cheer Athletic
is the nation's number one all star cheer gym. For
(09:06):
more details, check out Caomaha dot com. Jeff and Trent
and have the weekend off. I'm Brad Williams sitting next
to me as LUs Hicanos, and we're going to bring
our first guest of the day, actually our only guest
of the day. Today, we're joined by Eric Miller, streetcar
Operations Manager for the City of Omaha. Eric, Welcome back
to the show.
Speaker 4 (09:25):
Thanks good to be here.
Speaker 5 (09:26):
I was here in person a couple of years ago,
and then last December when we had the freezing ice,
I called in.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
Yeah, I remember that. It was a little tricky getting here.
I was on that day too, So well, since you
were on last you have a new role. You have
actually accepted the job and started as the City of
Omaha Streetcar Operations manager. You want to tell us a
little bit about your new role.
Speaker 5 (09:47):
Yeah, sure, So I've been doing this for about two
months now, pretty new, and it continues some of the
work I was doing as a consultant before. So basically
I am full time on the streetcar helping set up
our operations. We'll be in charge of service as we
get that, and also helping with obviously a communications effort
we've got letting people know about the streetcar and what
it's going to look like, and then also helping It's
(10:11):
basically a role that's helping the Omaha street Car Authority
because they are the designated agency that is running this
whole thing.
Speaker 2 (10:20):
So you know, besides you running the street car in
the city having a lot of control of that, you're
also going to have a private operations company. You want
to tell us little bit about that.
Speaker 5 (10:30):
Yeah, sure, So a lot of streetcar systems, especially in
cities where you don't already have a robust rail transit network,
will hire a private operator. So similar to what Kansas
City did, Oklahoma City, Cincinnati, Milwaukee, and so we have
a public RFP out right now that closes on September tenth.
Speaker 4 (10:47):
For a private operator.
Speaker 5 (10:49):
We've got four companies that are interested, and then we'll
look to select somebody this fall.
Speaker 4 (10:54):
And so that's going really well.
Speaker 5 (10:56):
And so basically they'll come in and they'll they will
hire all the operators, supervisors and mechanics to run the system.
Speaker 4 (11:03):
So, yeah, really excited about that. Progress is going well
on that.
Speaker 3 (11:07):
It's an exciting development overall in terms of the service
that will provide and times it's running. Let's talk a
little bit about the frequency. I know that first of all,
it's free, so nobody has to pay for it, correct, right, Yeah,
I like to say zero fair, right, and I love that.
And then the frequency, from what I understand is during
(11:28):
peak hours between ten am and seven pm during a
week it'll run in ten minute routes. Service routes every
ten minutes, and then off peak it'll be fifteen minutes.
And then on the weekends it it'll be twenty minutes.
Speaker 5 (11:44):
Yeah, and even on Saturdays and Sundays, we'll still have
a little like kind of midday. Most of day will
be ten every ten minutes.
Speaker 3 (11:50):
Right, and the hours of operation we're looking at her
six am until midnight, and then on the weekends on
Friday and Saturdays, it goes till two in the morning. Right.
Speaker 4 (12:00):
Yeah, that's the plan right now.
Speaker 5 (12:01):
And then obviously as we start running and see what
the ridership looks like, we can make adjustments.
Speaker 4 (12:05):
But yeah, that's what we're planning right now.
Speaker 3 (12:07):
Well, that's awesome. And again it's free, folks. You can't
get better than free. One of the things that when
I study the streetcar, one of the things if you
go to the website and read up on it, it's
amazing that you could see since the nineteen sixties the
city has basically replaced businesses with surface parking. Over fifty
(12:29):
percent in the Omaha City core is committed to surface parking,
and about fifty percent of those service those lots are empty.
Speaker 4 (12:37):
They're not being raced. Yeah.
Speaker 5 (12:38):
Yeah, and have you noticed as you walk through downtown
there's a lot of those surface lots that are locked.
Speaker 4 (12:42):
Up and closed.
Speaker 5 (12:43):
And I don't know what people are doing with that,
but yeah, let's activate those exactly.
Speaker 3 (12:47):
So the city has a very ambitious and I think
very realistic plan of adding thirty thousand jobs, you know,
and also thirty thousand residents to the downtown core or
core area population. And one of the benefits of having
a streetcar is the development that it can spur. Right now,
the estimate is it's going to spur nearly four billion
(13:10):
dollars of development along that line.
Speaker 5 (13:12):
Yep, Yeah, that's right. Yeah, and we're we're on track
ahead of that pace. So it's it's looking really good.
We've got a lot of exciting projects as as we
talk about on this show and so so, yeah, a
lot of cool stuff coming out of this.
Speaker 2 (13:24):
You know, we've just discussed how this benefits people in
the urban core, but what we get a lot of
people on the like the gro Omaha social media and stuff.
They always they always say, well, how does this benefit
us that live out west or how those benefit us
that don't go downtown. And you know, I got an
opinion that we have a lot of things in this
town that don't benefit everyone. You know, we have golf
(13:46):
courses and there's a lot of people that don't golf.
We have swimming pools, and we not everyone swims. We
have you know, libraries, not everyone reads. We have things.
It's more of like a complete package. We got to
have something for everyone in the streetcar will benefit a
ton of people. What's your opinion? What's your answer to that?
When you get people in West Omaha that say, I
(14:06):
never go downtown and this is dumb and I'm never
gonna come right it? Sure?
Speaker 5 (14:09):
Yeah, well I love that question because I live out
in Nocorn, so I'm kind of one of those good
labeled me as a West Omaha skeptic.
Speaker 4 (14:15):
But no, I think this is this is something that
will impact the region.
Speaker 5 (14:18):
I mean, it's similar in scope and size to our Zoo,
the Riverfront Park, the Chi Center. Even if you don't
use it, it's going to have those ripple effects of
making our city and our region better. And then also
even if if you're not like living or working downtown
or midtown, not using it every day, you might still
come downtown a few times a year, you know, like
I take my family down down in these places downtown
(14:40):
and the Zoo a few times a year, and it's great.
I mean, it's one of the benefits of living in Omaha,
and so I know the streetcar will be one of
those benefits of living in Omaha.
Speaker 4 (14:48):
And yeah, and excited.
Speaker 5 (14:49):
And also I want to mention that we're working this
into being part of the transit network and so you know,
it's it's not going to be in a vacuum, and
so you will be able to connect to it from
other trans modes and from other parts of the city
even if you don't want to drive, you know.
Speaker 2 (15:03):
And today would be a perfect example of what would
a good streetcar day would be Tonight all day Actually,
we have the Maha Music Festival in downtown Omaha. There's
not a ton of parking around that part of downtown
for the size of the crowd that that's going to generate.
And then also you're going to have people that are
going to like some bands not like other bands. And
(15:24):
so when the street car is active, people could take,
you know, they go to Midtown, eat lunch somewhere in
midtown Midtown Crossing or the Blackstone Hop. On the street car.
They could go down see a band or two that
they like, and then get right back out of there
and then come back later for maybe the headliner or something,
so there'd be opportunity to get in and out of
downtown quickly without trying to find a place to park
(15:46):
two three times.
Speaker 4 (15:47):
Yeah, yeah, definitely, exactly.
Speaker 5 (15:49):
And I also want to note that, so we're planning
to run four vehicles at the same time. During the peak,
we will have a fleet of up to six, so
I'm hoping that, you know, as long as as we
have our maintenance and they're in good shape, we might
be able to put an extra one in there and
run a little extra service on some of these special
event days, you know, like the event today or Jazz
on the Green or holiday lights and that sort of thing.
Speaker 3 (16:09):
Well, that that's and that this speaks to Brad's question too,
So in terms of the route and where it's going
to be running. So we're starting on eighth Street, looping
to tenth on Farnaman Harney, and it'll go all the
way out to Midtown crossing and into the Blackstone District
around thirty ninth Street, So that that would be the
route that we're running continuously.
Speaker 4 (16:31):
Yeah, yeah, for now.
Speaker 5 (16:32):
Initially, you're still working on trying to get this, especially
trying to get that UNMC segment done, like we initially
intended it to be of for example.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
But yeah, you know and Di Minutgo, you said we
were gonna be running four street cars at a time,
you'll have six. Have those been picked out or purchased ordered?
Speaker 4 (16:51):
Yeah, good question.
Speaker 5 (16:52):
So we entered into a notice to proceed with the
manufacturer acronym of c AF or CALF. They're headquartered in Spain.
They do make vehicles here in the United States and
so ours are. They're not quite under construction yet. We're
still sourcing all the parts, but they will be built
in Spain. And the timeline for those is we should
get our first vehicle here within about two years, so
kind of mid twenty twenty seven, and then they should
(17:14):
start coming in at a frequency of about once a month.
Speaker 3 (17:17):
And we have a storage facility currently under construction.
Speaker 5 (17:20):
Right yeah, yeah, our vehicle maintenance facility is being built
right now. Samson is the lead constructor on that. They
also built the Kawasaki plant and Lincoln. They're bas in Lincoln,
and so so yeah, that's going really well. It's started
under construction back in April. You can go down and
check it out. It's really close to the park that's
just south of the Luminarium and just north of where
(17:41):
the new Children's Museum will be.
Speaker 2 (17:43):
Yeah, if you park at the Luminarium and on the
west side of that parking, now there's a bike trail.
Just walk down the bike trail a little bit to
the south and you'll be able to see where the
streetcar facility is going. Right now, it looks like about
two hundred pipes pounded in the ground and they've.
Speaker 4 (17:56):
Been foundations going in.
Speaker 5 (17:59):
But yeah, a great view of it there. And also
the skyline right behind there. You know that I for
eighty is a little bit of an icere, but but yeah,
a good view of it there.
Speaker 2 (18:06):
All right, Well, we're gonna take our middle of the
show break and when we come back, it'll be time
for our Not a Company Spotlight Project Spotlight. You've been
listening to Groa Maha brought to you by Dingman's Closion
Center and Cheer Athletics. We'll be right back after this
on news Radio eleven ten KFAB and welcome back to
Girl Maha. We're brought to you by Cheer Athletic and
(18:28):
Dingman's Collision Center. Dingman's Closion Center is a family owned
autobody shop with four metro locations and they do mechanical
repair as well well. Now it's time for our not
A Companies development spotlight. Not A Companies is a Omaha
based full service real estate company. They can be reached
at not alcmpanies dot com. So our spotlight for not
(18:51):
this week is on a piece of ground they own
out on the west end of Village Point Village Point
West and is H and H Kia. This week, H
and H Kia broke ground on a new car dealership
on nine point seven seven acres between Walgreens and Core
Bank on the southeast side of one hundred and eightieth
and Burke Street in the Village Point West. The Kia
(19:14):
dealership will include sales and service and enough space for
six hundred cars on site. Construction should be complete at
the end of twenty twenty six. Kia has a current
dealership and papillion on the north the east corner of
Highway fifty and three seventy. So, Lou, what's your favorite
not all companies development?
Speaker 3 (19:34):
Man, there's so many great ones to talk about. I
love what they've done in Builders District Headquarter, you know,
spearheaded by the key Keyweit World Headquarters and you know,
they have a timber building that's a kind of a
business building there, and some also residential. But I think
probably out of all of them, my favorite has to
(19:54):
be Exorban Village. It's such an inviting masterpiece of what
her great urban infilm mixed use development can be. Being
old enough to remember what that area used to be
back in the day it was a race track and
Exarbon call CEM and now to see it actually be
an urban infoll success story, I can't tell you. I
(20:16):
bring people in from out of town and to that
particular area and they're always amazed by it.
Speaker 2 (20:21):
Yeah, Exarbon Village is definitely awesome. My favorite, though, is
the River's Edge over in Council Blast because it has
some of the best views of the Omaha skyline.
Speaker 3 (20:32):
That's premium right there.
Speaker 2 (20:34):
So let's get back to our conversation with Eric Miller.
Eric is the streetcar operations manager for this city of Omaha.
So Eric construction is already underway. We talked about it
a little bit before the commercial break that the streetcar
barn is underway, but there is other pieces of the
construction underway. I noticed today on the way down here
that the crews are pouring the concrete deck on the
(20:57):
Harney Street Bridge, which will be one of the first
pieces of the project to be completed.
Speaker 3 (21:04):
Right.
Speaker 5 (21:04):
Yeah, that's super exciting because that project is a little
head of schedule right now, so that's great. And you'll
notice the rails aren't going in on the bridge yet.
Those will come in next year. But then when we
get to Farnham, which will which is right now is
a plan to start construction turn that down in January
twenty twenty six. Those that'll that'll go in with the
(21:25):
rails in there because of your land track next year.
Speaker 2 (21:28):
And you know why you can't while the rails are
not going in, you can actually see you could see
they were forming the bridge differently where the rails are
going to be, so if you wanted to see, you know,
kind of a preview shot. I think if Jeff hasn't
posted it on the girl Maha facebook page yet, I'm
going to get that picture posted up soon. Also, I
(21:48):
was driving through the Blackstone district today and they were
actually removing the old historic street car rails to work
on the utilities. The utility infrastructure it needs to be
improved before the new street tracks to go in, so
it was kind of cool to see the old the
old rusty rails they're sitting in the middle of Farm Street.
Speaker 4 (22:06):
Yeah right, yeah.
Speaker 5 (22:07):
A lot of times, you know, when after the streetcar
service ended, which ended over on March fourth, nineteen fifty five,
a lot of times the cruiser's coming and just poor
asphalt right over the old brick and rails.
Speaker 4 (22:17):
And so as you dig that up, you can see it.
Speaker 5 (22:18):
And sometimes in a lot of areas where the street
car used to run, you can see the cracks and
the asphalt where the rails.
Speaker 2 (22:24):
Still are still are they just kind of pushing the
asshalt up a little higher than the surrounding pavement. So
what's next with the streetcar?
Speaker 5 (22:32):
Okay, so right now you'll notice, you know, all along
Farnam and Harney, we got a lot of utility work
going on. Officially, Hawkins is in charge of the utility.
It's called Utilities West, which is west the for Eity Bridge,
and then we're starting on what's called Utilities East, which
will be in more there's we've already done some work downtown.
We'll do more work in the downtown area. And then
also the one contract that we haven't awarded yet is
(22:55):
the utilities for turn of Boulevard. Turn a Boulevard is
an interesting place because that's where the track goes from
double track on Farnham to splitting on Farnham and Harney.
And then we've also got what's called a y in
there and so you'll be able to turn streetcars kind
of halfway through if you need to, if we have
to do any kind of short terms or service disruptions.
Are also special events, so that'll be coming up. And
(23:18):
then we also just recently awarded Keywit for the overall
track construction for the whole main line, So all that's
going on in addition to the maintenance facility that I
talked about earlier.
Speaker 4 (23:28):
Those are our big projects.
Speaker 3 (23:30):
Wow, that's a lot going on now. We know there
was a new estimate for the cost overall now at
four hundred and twenty one million, and that was just
earlier last month. I believe it's like thirty days ago.
And we've got a new mayor. We've had a good
transition from the previous administration to the new one and
our new Mayor Ewing seems to be completely on board
(23:52):
and wanting to even enhance the development of the streetcar.
Let's talk a little bit about the future. Where do
we see it going.
Speaker 5 (24:01):
Yeah, sure, so as we get closer to opening this one,
and then as we open it, we'll see how successful
it is, and then I think there'll be you know,
more demand for extensions, So we're trying to get ready
for that. Obviously, we've we've got a couple of studies
that are going on already. City of Council Bluffs has
kind of taking it on themselves to do do studies,
and they're on a kind of a preliminary environmental study
right now that should be wrapping up end of this year,
(24:23):
maybe early next year. Waiting for some updated travel demand
modeling from from the regional UH government agency here, but
that that planning is going well. We've also got federal
funding for an extension looking north of downtown, so hoping
to get that study started maybe later this year. But
(24:44):
there's also some other obvious, you know areas as I
mentioned earlier, Getting that un MC extension is a big
deal that could continue further west, you know, through Saddle
Creek and Xarbon for example. That might be a solid extension.
There's other other quarridors north that you could look into.
And then obviously south that was part of the original
like late nineties tenth Street trolleys go to the Zoo,
(25:07):
that could go down tenth or thirteenth Street, take advantage
of some of the new development and other development potential,
and connecting one of our big tourist attractions down there.
Speaker 3 (25:16):
All right, absolutely, I mean, we know the Zoo is
the number one tourist attraction in the state of Nebraska,
so it makes perfect sense to have that connectivity with
the streetcar. And again, can't overemphasize we talked earlier about
the amount of development that along the streetcar line, that
this can spur nearly four billion dollars, and all of
that can be cultural amenities, business, mixed use, residential. It's
(25:41):
not just happened. It's not just something we're talking about
that could happen in Omaha currently is and it has
happened in other cities like Kansas City, right.
Speaker 4 (25:51):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (25:51):
Another thing I'm excited about is the potential for a
south extension is connecting Amtrak and future you know, commuter
rail to Lincoln and other other points like that.
Speaker 2 (26:00):
So, so, how far along or down the road do
you see some of these exits? Are we talking like
a five year plan or like a twenty year plan.
Speaker 4 (26:09):
You know, it could go either way.
Speaker 5 (26:10):
I think it really depends on on again how successful
the starter line is, which wire working really hard to
make it that way, and then and then also depends
on you know, we find champions community support for each
each corridor. There's also some obviously organizational structure that needs
to be adjusted with Metro or Metro transit, and.
Speaker 4 (26:33):
But but also just just yeah, figuring out.
Speaker 5 (26:35):
And so if you look at other cities, things are
fairly quick, like so Kansas City Streetcar open nine years
ago and they're opening their first two extensions this year,
so it took them about nine years.
Speaker 3 (26:45):
You know.
Speaker 5 (26:45):
The other places, if we do incremental extensions, like like
Portland Streetcar did, might only be five years. So it
kind of varies, you know, the the amount of the extension,
the support and the funding.
Speaker 3 (26:56):
For it, and the the initial line. I know we
will be testing it in twenty twenty seven into twenty
twenty eight, and then we'd be online by twenty twenty eight.
Speaker 4 (27:07):
Yeah, yeah, that's right.
Speaker 5 (27:08):
So yeah, we're mid twenty twenty eight still a good
estimate right now. So as we stay stay on schedule
with this stuff. But yeah, it'll be really important that
that we keep keep going on all these on all
these cylinders in extra years.
Speaker 2 (27:22):
You know, we're kind of going back a little bit here,
But when where did the where's the east end terminating?
Is it in front of CHI or is it down
by the baseball stadium more.
Speaker 5 (27:32):
Yeah, there'll be a stop just east of tenth Street
on Capitol Avenue and so just south of CHI and
then that's where it does its loop around down to
eighth Street. And then there'll be a stop right across
the Children's Museum really close to the Orbit stop there.
That's an area where that I see as a potential
future multimodal hub or mobility hub or you can have
transfers to different other different multimodal and bike sharing that
(27:54):
sort of thing.
Speaker 2 (27:55):
So when this is all online and running for the
cultural series, that people will get off at ten in
Capitol and then walk down the hill too.
Speaker 5 (28:03):
Yeah, and then that could be like talking about incremental extensions,
that could be one where you go north a couple
of blocks or whatever.
Speaker 2 (28:09):
Yeah, and you've been on this show before and talked
about how an extension to the airport is not really
a feasible extension, at least not in the initial plans.
Speaker 4 (28:20):
Obly not for a street car.
Speaker 5 (28:21):
If you're looking at having stops every three to four blocks,
that'd be a really slow way to get there.
Speaker 2 (28:25):
Yeah, But when you're talking like we talked about the
Zoo earlier, that seems to me like that's a no
brainer corridor.
Speaker 4 (28:32):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (28:32):
I mean, the way Thirteenth Street is blown up over
the last few years, you could have a couple stops
on there, and that could be even a more thriving
neighborhood than it already.
Speaker 4 (28:42):
Is, right, Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 3 (28:44):
Yeah, Yeah, we were talking about bred and I had
a conversation about this the other day about how, okay,
if we were going to go streetcar to the Zoo,
what would be the best street to go. Would it
be Thirteenth Street or Tenth Street? Yeah, you know, Thirteenth Street.
We know we've got the the district there that's you know,
kind of blowing up a little bit. And then you
got a little Italy along seventh to tenth. You got
(29:08):
little Bohemia there on Thirteenth, So you know, it's it's
kind of speculation, but both I could I could see
both being feasible.
Speaker 5 (29:16):
Yeah, totally. Yeah, that's why I think we need to
study it more. Both were a historic streetcar corridor. Its
interestingly enough, service stopped running on Thirteenth Street in nineteen
thirty six because they did a pavement project, and some
services on ten Street until nineteen fifty five.
Speaker 3 (29:31):
So, you know, it's funny. When I was a kid,
I used to hear my mother talk about how she
used to ride the streetcar, you know, and she grew
up in an area around twenty fourth and Mason Street,
and streetcar ran right down there, and it used to
go north to south, south to north, and I used
to hear stories. And now that we talk about the
streetcar today, potential for it and well the fact that
(29:52):
it is going to open in twenty twenty eight, it's
exciting to me.
Speaker 4 (29:55):
Yeah, totally.
Speaker 2 (29:56):
Well, Eric, we always appreciate you joining us. You provide
so much of able insight on this subject. I know
there's still a lot of haters out there on the
street car, but I think with constant education and you know,
reminding people that, you know, it's part of a complete
city and we need, you know, we talk about brain
drain and keeping the younger people here. We talk about
being complete. This is just one piece of the puzzle
(30:18):
to have a complete city. So yeah, hopefully everyone's on board.
It's still not costing anyone a dollar out of their
taxes because it's completely funded by TIFF. So thanks for
coming on and talking about all this again and can't
wait to have you back hopefully soon and hopefully you
have more cool stuff to tell us.
Speaker 4 (30:35):
Yeah. Thanks.
Speaker 5 (30:36):
I want to give a quick shout out to We
have a live webinar the first Wednesday of the month
at noon if you want to learn more about it,
So first Wednesday of the month at noon, and it's
on YouTube our Omaha street Car YouTube channel and go
to Omaha streetcard dot org if you want to send
in a question for us.
Speaker 2 (30:52):
So, the Omaha street Car has their own dedicated YouTube channel.
Speaker 4 (30:55):
Ye okay, yeah, research Omaha street Car Authority. You'll find
it great.
Speaker 2 (30:58):
I did not know that. All right, when we come back,
it's time for the Perkins Christer Construction Lightning Round. You're
listening to grol Maha, brought to you by Deemon's Collision
Center along with Cheer Athletics. We'll be back right after
this on news Radio eleven ten KFAB and Welcome back
to the Gromha Show. We're brought to you by Cheer
Athletics and Demon's Collision Center. It's now time for the
(31:20):
Lightning Round, brought to you by Perkins christ Construction. Perkins
Christer is a full service class a general contractor based
in Omaha and Lincoln and Council Bluffs surrounding areas. Are
based in Omaha, serving the surrounding areas. Their experienced construction
team of project managers, project administrator, superintendent's, carpenters and labors,
(31:41):
many with over thirty years experience. If you need more information,
see their website at pcconstruction dot com. Well, I have
a new item here that was not on the script
I sent you Lou this morning. When I was on
my way to studio. The Dollar Store at thirty fifth
and level Worth is on a big hole in the
(32:01):
ground with a pile rubbel in it. This is going
to be redeveloped into another nice looking apartment building along
the Levenworth Street corridor. The Elevenworth Street corridor has really
blown up in the last few years.
Speaker 4 (32:14):
Oh totally.
Speaker 3 (32:14):
I used to live in that neck of the woods
and that Dollar General store was there even in the
nineties when I was living there, and it's so great
to see the new construction in that area. It's needed.
Speaker 2 (32:24):
Yeah. So last year the Cosgrove Apartment, it's a beautiful
brick building open just to the west of it. And
then this year there's another smaller apartment on thirty six
and Level war So this would just be another building
the cap.
Speaker 3 (32:37):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (32:39):
So Hyper Energy Bar, a beverage chain from Urbandale, Iowa,
is planning to open two locations in West Omha. The
first one, a nine hundred square foot building on the
southwest corner of one hundred eightieth and West Maple Road,
is now under construction. The second will be a double
drive through building on one hundred eightieth and Burke Street
west of Village Point. Construction on the second will start
(33:00):
in early December, with the planned opening in January. Hyper
currently has seven locations, six in the Des Moines, Iowa area,
and one in Iowa City.
Speaker 3 (33:11):
And the disclaimer is you don't buy energy bars there.
It's an actual bar bar all right up.
Speaker 2 (33:16):
Next yesterday Smoking Barrel Barbecue opened their brand new location
on one hundred and eightieth Street. This is just north
to center. You got that strip mall there with a
lighthouse bar and there was an Asian restaurant. This replaced
a firehouse subs location. I know, Lou, you are like
(33:37):
me and Jeff and a lot of people. Barbecue is
one of your favorites.
Speaker 3 (33:41):
Oh yeah, and since this one is really close to
my residence area, I can literally walk there. I love barbecue.
Love having another option, So.
Speaker 2 (33:50):
This will be a lot more of a visible location.
Their previous location was down in Millard, kind of off
behind that old Baker's down there by the Millard Airport.
We do have a little bit of bad news. Chicken
and Pickle, which everyone was excited was going to open
at one hundred and twenty th and fort and they
are no longer going to open a Nebraska location. They
(34:11):
said that they changing their shift in strategic growth and
they're going to focus on their existing locations. This is
going to be the first year in many years that
they have not opened a new location.
Speaker 4 (34:22):
Yep.
Speaker 3 (34:22):
I had read an article about that they're kind of
taking putting the brakes on and kind of digesting I
guess a little bit.
Speaker 2 (34:30):
Yeah, Chicken and Pickle down in Kansas City, it's a
really cool looking place. It's going to be a neat
addition to Omaha. Hopefully they find something else kind of
cool in that area. We do have like Blue Sky here,
which I really enjoyed. Definitely tasty pizza, which is a
favorite of my kids. By the way, will open a
new restaurant at fourteen twenty one North Salad Creek Road
(34:53):
near Sergeant Peffer's Italian. Construction is expected to be complete
in the fall of twenty twenty six the local. It
currently operates in the former gas station, but plans to
upgrade the space to more efficient kitchen and drive through
carry out orders. According to the City Clerk's office, Oma
has some great pizza and this is just another one,
(35:13):
you know, we we sure do.
Speaker 3 (35:15):
And the development in that area just keeps coming. Yeah,
love seeing it.
Speaker 2 (35:19):
That whole There's there's a ton of untapped potential too
in that whole Saddle Creek in Northwest Radial area totally
Keydoba Mexican Eats opened its new Elkhorn store late last
week in the former Oklahoma Joe's Barbecue space fourteen oh
five South two hundred and fourth Street. Oklahoma Joe's closed
their restaurant several months ago, but continues to operate the
(35:40):
store at Exarbon Village, Kidoba now has eleven metro area locations.
Speaker 3 (35:45):
Another person that frequents ke Dooba. You know, it's good
to see that option come up. It's a decent alternative
to the traditional fast food.
Speaker 2 (35:55):
Well, Lou, I really appreciate you joining me today. It's great.
You know, like you said, we do this off the
air all the time. But what are you also excited
to see things that we didn't cover? What else is
going on? Omaha? Are you excited to see coming up
in the next year?
Speaker 3 (36:13):
I think in it again, I echo the same. This
is like you and I having a conversation that we
have together, and you know, I'm really excited to see
the area and the development. Also with the new library
coming up, you know that's going to be opening up
next year, along with the crossroads development. I think all
that every time I drive by there. I think, man,
(36:35):
I picture what it's going to look like once it
gets done, and how incredible that whole seventy second Street
and Dodge area is going to look like. So that's
one thing that I'm excited about. I'm also big and
bullish on the core, so talking about development in north downtown,
talking about development along the new park system, along the
streetcar route. All of those things just get the juices
(36:57):
flowing for me. You know.
Speaker 2 (36:59):
The library put out a new video just sometime in
the last two weeks on their Facebook page kind of
going over the whole plan for it, and it's going
to have so many more features than just you know,
you think traditional library books and magazines, but this everything
from a cafe to the dou space three D print
lab is going to have so many great things in there.
(37:21):
And it's a pretty awesome looking building when you drive
buy on Saturday Second Street.
Speaker 3 (37:24):
It's going to be absolutely beautiful. And one other thing
too that I'm excited about is the airport.
Speaker 2 (37:30):
Oh yeah, they can't wait for the airport, get that.
And you know at our airport, what we never had
before is going to have a lounge ship for a
lounge up on the third floor, which is awesome. Well again,
thanks for joining us. You've been listening to the Girl
Maha Show. We'll be back next Saturday morning at nine
am right here on news Radio eleven ten KFAB
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