2024: The Extension of a Light Rail System in Arizona is Celebrated with Both a Ribbon-Cutting and a Poem

January 27, 2024

In the northwestern part of Arizona’s capital city of Phoenix, more than 2,000 people turned out for the opening of a 1.6-mile (2.6-kilometer) extension of Valley Metro Rail. This light rail system’s newest segment at the time encompassed three stations altogether.

One of these stations is Metro Parkway station, which is the northwestern terminus of Valley Metro Rail.  This station is also the first elevated one in the entire system. In addition, Metro Parkway station, which is featured in the accompanying photo, has a relocated multimodal transit hub that is served by five Valley Metro Bus routes. The hub was named in memory of Thelda Williams, who had served on the Phoenix City Council and was appointed the city’s interim mayor a total of three times. She died in 2023 at the age of 82.

The extension of Valley Metro Rail in that section of Phoenix was officially called Northwest Extension Phase II. The inaugural festivities for this addition were held at Metro Parkway station, with a large number of dignitaries taking part in a ribbon-cutting ceremony. They included Kate Gallego, mayor of Phoenix; Nuria Fernandez, administrator of the Federal Transit Administration; Greg Stanton, U.S. representative; and Jessica Mefford-Miller, Valley Metro chief executive officer. Some of Thelda Williams’ relatives likewise participated in this ceremony.

Alberto Rios, who became Arizona’s state poet laureate in 2013, also attended this celebration. His unique contribution of the event involved reading his poem The Light Rail Hummingbird to those in attendance. Rios’ poem included the following lines:

“The light rail is a rolling community,

A shared space of living stories in quiet strangers . . .

Light rail is the city’s steel hummingbird,

Moving from stop to stop, flower to flower.”

Valley Metro Rail serves not only Phoenix but also the cities of Tempe and Mesa in the Grand Canyon State. The system covers a total of 29.8 miles (48 kilometers) and consists of 41 stations altogether.

Photo Credit: Dannyphx (licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International license at https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

Additional information on the debut of Valley Metro Rail services completed as part of Northwest Extension Phase II is available at https://www.valleymetro.org/news/2024/01/opening-of-new-light-rail-extension-in-phoenix-celebrated-by-officials-community

A video of Alberto Rios reading his poem The Light Rail Hummingbird at the dedication ceremony at Metro Parkway station is available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DI9SJXy8LVw

For more information on Valley Metro Rail, please check out https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valley_Metro_Rail