Branson monorail proposal rolling along

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Representatives from Transco Holdings Inc., the company that wants to build a monorail in Branson, will be returning to visit with more business owners along the town's famous entertainment strip about the proposal.|ret||ret||tab|

According to a news release from the city of Branson, about 20 designers, engineers and manufacturers involved in the monorail visited Branson March 16 to meet further with city officials and present their plans on a one-to-one basis to the Highway 76 businesspeople. |ret||ret||tab|

Headed by Ron Watson, chairman of Hawaii-based Transco Holdings Inc., the delegation sought to determine which businesses are interested in having a monorail passenger station on their property. There is a cost to businesses to do so, but Watson said the return in terms of more customers would far outweigh the investment. "At Disney World in Orlando," he said, "hotels that have a monorail passenger station on their properties experience a 95 percent occupancy rate."|ret||ret||tab|

Watson said the businesses his group talked to were very receptive about a monorail in Branson, but that he ran out of time in visiting others. He said he will return in about five weeks for further meetings with Highway 76 business owners.|ret||ret||tab|

Transco Holdings is bringing together the companies who would build the privately financed $170 million monorail, the release said. The company group also came to Branson to answer technical questions raised by city officials and to present an artist's rendering of the monorail system traveling along Highway 76.|ret||ret||tab|

The proposed 9.2-mile monorail route would be the longest monorail system in the United States, according to a news release from Transco. Part of it would extend from downtown Branson to Shepherd of the Hills Expressway and then eastward to the Shoji Tabuchi Theater. Another segment would run from downtown south across Lake Taneycomo to the College of the Ozarks Airport. Transco said construction would take about two years.|ret||ret||tab|

City officials are working with the company on completing a contract whereby Transco would build, operate and then transfer the monorail to the city. No public funding would be required for the project.|ret||ret||tab|

Transco estimated that 10,000 passengers would ride the Severn-Lamb monorail trains each day, paying $2.50 per ride, or $7 for an all-day pass. Watson said the approval process "is in the final stages now."|ret||ret||tab|

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