The Waterfront Line is a light rail line of the

RTA Rapid Transit RTA Rapid Transit (generally known as The Rapid) is a rapid transit, light rail, and bus rapid transit system. The system is owned and operated by the Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority (GCRTA). The system serves Cleveland and surroun ...

system in

Cleveland Cleveland ( ), officially the City of Cleveland, is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Cuyahoga County. Located in the northeastern part of the state, it is situated along the southern shore of Lake Erie, across the U.S. ...

Ohio Ohio () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Of the fifty U.S. states, it is the 34th-largest by area, and with a population of nearly 11.8 million, is the seventh-most populous and tenth-most densely populated. The sta ...

, running from

Tower City Center Tower City Center is a large mixed-use facility in Downtown Cleveland, Ohio, on its Public Square. The facility is composed of a number of interconnected office buildings, including Terminal Tower, the Avenue shopping mall, Jack Cleveland Casino ...

downtown, then north and northeast to station, adjacent to the Cleveland Municipal Parking Lot. The Waterfront Line is the newest rail line in Cleveland, having opened in 1996. The 2.2 mile (3.5 km) line is unique in that it is an extension of the

Blue Blue is one of the three primary colours in the RYB colour model (traditional colour theory), as well as in the RGB (additive) colour model. It lies between violet and cyan on the spectrum of visible light. The eye perceives blue when obs ...

and

Green Green is the color between cyan and yellow on the visible spectrum. It is evoked by light which has a dominant wavelength of roughly 495570 Nanometre, nm. In subtractive color systems, used in painting and color printing, it is created by ...

lines, but has its own naming designation. All RTA light rail lines use

overhead lines An overhead line or overhead wire is an electrical cable that is used to transmit electrical energy to electric locomotives, trolleybuses or trams. It is known variously as: * Overhead catenary * Overhead contact system (OCS) * Overhead equipmen ...

and pantographs to draw power.

History

The line opened on July 10, 1996, coinciding with Cleveland's bicentennial celebration which took place later in the year. The line had a total cost of $70.9 million and was funded by a combination of bonds, grant money from the

Ohio Department of Transportation The Ohio Department of Transportation (ODOT; ) is the administrative department of the Ohio state government responsible for developing and maintaining all state and U.S. roadways outside of municipalities and all Interstates except the Ohio T ...

, and local RTA funding. Service on the Waterfront Line was suspended indefinitely in 2021, after previously being suspended in October 2020. Plans call for opening in time for the 2023

Cleveland Browns The Cleveland Browns are a professional American football team based in Cleveland. Named after original coach and co-founder Paul Brown, they compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the American Football Conference ( ...

season.

Route description

From South Harbor, the lines extends generally west-southwest adjacent to the former

New York Central Railroad The New York Central Railroad was a railroad primarily operating in the Great Lakes and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. The railroad primarily connected greater New York and Boston in the east with Chicago and St. Louis in the Midw ...

tracks, now owned by

Norfolk Southern The Norfolk Southern Railway is a Railroad classes, Class I freight railroad in the United States formed in 1982 with the merger of Norfolk and Western Railway and Southern Railway (U.S.), Southern Railway. With headquarters in Atlanta, the ...

. Notable destinations along the line include the

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and

FirstEnergy Stadium FirstEnergy Stadium is a stadium in Cleveland, Ohio, United States, primarily for American football. It is the home field of the Cleveland Browns of the National Football League (NFL), and serves as a venue for other events such as college and h ...

. Trains will stop at

Amtrak The National Railroad Passenger Corporation, Trade name, doing business as Amtrak () , is the national Passenger train, passenger railroad company of the United States. It operates inter-city rail service in 46 of the 48 contiguous United Stat ...

's Cleveland Lakefront Station upon request. The line continues along an elevated loop, allowing it to turn from west-southwest to south-southeast, cross over the Norfolk Southern tracks and travel along the east bank of

The Flats The Flats is a mixed-use industrial, recreational, entertainment, and residential area of the Cuyahoga Valley neighborhood of Cleveland, Ohio, USA. The name reflects its low-lying topography on the banks of the Cuyahoga River. History In 1 ...

. The route passes through three grade crossings. The line then turns east and climbs up from The Flats in two cuts on either side of the Red Line. It merges onto the Red Line tracks and travels through . Through service between the Waterfront Line and the Blue and Green Lines is provided at Tower City. From April 2010 through May 2013, RTA completely eliminated weekday regularly scheduled Waterfront Line service due to low ridership and trains ran on the line only on weekends and for special events. Though seven-day-a-week service on the line was restored, a number of trains continue to use Tower City as a western terminus. Tower City is the major station on all RTA Rapid Transit lines. It is the main station serving downtown Cleveland and it provides a convenient transfer point between the Red Line and the Blue and Green Lines.

Future extensions

Plans have been drawn up to loop the Waterfront Line back through downtown to Tower City along city streets, but it seems unlikely to move forward in the near future. With the completion of the

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project, a new heavy rail line has been proposed that will connect Rocky River and Euclid. There has also been a proposal to extend the Waterfront line, from the current South Harbor (municipal parking lot at East 14th Street) eastward along the lakefront, to the Glenville or Collinwood neighborhoods or to

Euclid Euclid (; grc-gre, Wikt:Εὐκλείδης, Εὐκλείδης; BC) was an ancient Greek mathematician active as a geometer and logician. Considered the "father of geometry", he is chiefly known for the ''Euclid's Elements, Elements'' trea ...

or beyond. This eastward expansion is still a part of the Cleveland Planning Commission's Lakefront Development proposal. An additional station on the Waterfront Line section that loops over the NS tracks, is a part of nearly every plan for that area. Initially, the Cleveland World Trade Center would have had the station in the lobby of the facility, then the Eaton Corp headquarters, but neither project was built. Currently, the announced Lakefront Redevelopment plan has the proposed station as an integral part.

Service

Blue and Green Line trains operate from approximately 3:40 a.m. to 1:00 a.m. daily. On weekdays, each line operates every 10 minutes during rush hour and every 30 minutes at other times. Service between Tower City and Shaker Square operates every 5 minutes during rush hour and every 15 minutes at other times. Service on the Waterfront Line is limited to approximately every three westbound trains from 6:35 a.m. to 8:50 a.m. and again from 3:35 p.m. through 7:20 p.m. Between 8:50 a.m. and 3:35 p.m. and again between 7:20 p.m. and 10:20 p.m., all westbound trains travel along the Waterfront Line. No Waterfront Line service is provided between 10:45 p.m. and 6:35 a.m. On weekends, each line operates every 30 minutes. Service between Tower City and Shaker Square operates every 15 minutes and all westbound trains from 9:20 a.m. through 10:20 p.m. operate on the Waterfront Line.

Rail replacement bus

During rail shutdowns, RTA uses replacement buses signed as route 67R. These shuttle buses run between Tower City and South Harbor on surface streets.

Stations

Settlers Landing Cleveland RTA station 1

All stations are located within

Downtown Cleveland Downtown Cleveland is the central business district of Cleveland, Ohio. The economic and symbolic center of the city and the Cleveland-Akron-Canton, OH Combined Statistical Area, it is Cleveland's oldest district, with its Public Square laid out b ...

References

External links

Routes - Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority - RailJon Bell - Cleveland, Ohio: The Waterfront Line
*

Northern Ohio Railway Museum Northern Ohio Railway Museum is a railroad museum located near Chippewa Lake, Ohio, United States. The museum is a non-profit, educational organization. It was established in 1965, granted 501(c)(3) status by the Internal Revenue Service in 1966 a ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Waterfront Line (RTA Rapid Transit) Light rail in Ohio Standard gauge railways in the United States 600 V DC railway electrification Railway lines opened in 1996 1996 establishments in Ohio