AURORA — More than 20 years after the first segment of light rail opened in metro Denver, the Regional Transportation District is poised to launch its latest train line through the heart of Aurora with a critical new connection for transit riders headed to the airport.

“It is a big day for Aurora,” said RTD general manager Dave Genova, standing aboard the new R-Line light-rail train as it rolled alongside Interstate 225 on Friday morning. “I think it’s going to open up a lot more commuting opportunities for people in the southeast portion of the metro area.”

Genova joined reporters on a media ride of the new train, which is part of metro Denver’s still-growing 118-mile FasTracks transit network. The 22-mile R-Line, which runs from Lincoln Station in Lone Tree to Peoria Station in Aurora, opens to the public Feb. 24.

But the real work was the construction of 10.5 miles of new track — totaling $687 million — that connects Nine Mile Station with Peoria, a stubborn gap in Denver’s transit system that kept the state’s third-largest city from fully linking to its neighbors. It also allows Aurora commuters to ride the new line to Peoria and easily transfer to the University of Colorado A-Line, which provides access to downtown Denver and to Denver International Airport. According to the RTD schedule for the R-Line, a trip from end to end should take just under an hour.

“Connecting a city center with light rail opens up economic development and transit-oriented development that without that connection you don’t have,” Genova said.

Aurora Mayor Steve Hogan said his city of 350,000 has been preparing for this day a long time, with various projects already sprouting up around the eight new light-rail stations that will go live in a week. That includes the burgeoning Anschutz medical complex at the north end of the line, the new Veterans Administration Hospital, a hotel at the 2nd Avenue stop, and new developments around Aurora Metro Center Station.

“There are good things happening at several stations already and we would expect more,” the mayor said. “We look at northeast Aurora as the next 50 years of our city. Developers can open a map and say, ‘Aha!’ It’s just another tool that developers have to help us as a jurisdiction get quality development that brings us housing, retail and jobs.”

The R-Line, which serves 16 stations and is expected to have daily ridership of 12,000 one year after it opens, jumped from concept to reality nearly five years ago, when RTD picked Kiewit Infrastructure Co. to complete the unbuilt portion of the line through Aurora. At the time, Kiewit said it expected to finish the line in November 2015 at a cost of $350 million.

RTD spokesman Scott Reed said Kiewit’s costs were in line with its estimates, but with right-of-way acquisitions, environmental studies, the purchase of 19 light-rail vehicles and insurance, the total project cost was closer to $700 million.

The project’s timeline was thrown off a bit in 2013 when CU president Bruce Benson asked RTD to move the new line’s alignment off East Montview Boulevard to protect sensitive equipment in medical and research facilities on the 578-acre Fitzsimons campus from vibrations and electromagnetic interference generated by the trains as they pass University Hospital, Children’s Hospital Colorado and the VA Hospital.

Joe Amon, The Denver Post The R-Line train, RTD's latest rail line to open pulls into Peoria Station Feb. 17, 2017 in Aurora.

Joe Amon, The Denver Post The R-Line, RTD's latest rail line to open at Peoria Station Feb. 17, 2017 in Aurora.

Joe Amon, The Denver Post The R-Line, RTD's latest rail line to open at Peoria Station Feb. 17, 2017 in Aurora.



Joe Amon, The Denver Post The R-Line train, RTD's latest rail line to open at Colfax Station Feb. 17, 2017 in Aurora.

Joe Amon, The Denver Post The R-Line train at Peoria Station Feb. 17, 2017 in Aurora. RTD turned 50 on Monday.

Joe Amon, The Denver Post The R-Line train , RTD's latest rail line to open pulling into the Florida station Feb. 17, 2017 in Aurora.



Joe Amon, The Denver Post Dave Genova, RTD General Manager and CEO talks during a media ride on the R-Line, RTD's latest rail line to open, Feb. 17, 2017 in Aurora.

Joe Amon, The Denver Post The R-Line train, RTD's latest rail line to open pulls into Peoria Station Feb. 17, 2017 in Aurora.

Joe Amon, The Denver Post Train operator Thomas Houser in the drivers seat of the R-Line train, RTD's latest rail line to open at the Peoria Station Feb. 17, 2017 in Aurora.



Genova said another big design challenge with the R-Line was running it through Aurora’s city center, complete with sharp curves, slower speeds and at-grade crossings.

“I think we have every kind of safety device you can put on a crossing,” said Genova, who served as RTD’s safety chief before taking charge of the agency last year.

But that jog through the heart of Aurora is a critical component of the new light-rail line, according to RTD director Bob Broom, who once served as a councilman for the city. He represents the area encompassing the northern half of the R-Line.

“I think it’s going to rejuvenate that area that has laid fallow in the middle of the city for years,” Broom said. “I call this new line Aurora’s new Main Street.”

For metro-area commuters who are accustomed to traveling by light rail, the R-Line will sound and feel familiar. It will provide more than 1,200 new parking spaces on its freshly constructed section through Aurora. But three of the new stations — Colfax, Fitzsimons and Florida — do not have parking.

The Fitzsimons Station will provide free shuttle buses for workers to access the sprawling medical campus.

RTD parking regulations — first 24 hours free for those who live in the RTD district — apply at all the new stations except for Iliff, which will charge $3 per day at the new city-owned, 600-space garage.

For those using the R-Line and A-Line to access DIA, they can purchase a regional day pass for $9 at any of the stops on the R-Line and transfer to the A-Line at Peoria for free. RTD will also expand the H-Line two stops to the Florida Station starting Feb. 24 to give more Aurora residents another option to get to downtown Denver.

The R-Line is the first light-rail line to open since the W-Line went operational between Golden and Denver Union Station in 2013. Two new commuter rail lines — the A-Line and the B-Line, connecting Denver to Westminster — opened in 2016.

With the R-Line’s official opening next week, FasTracks will have about 75 miles of rail in operation.

The N-Line, a commuter rail line serving residents of Commerce City, Northglenn and Thornton, is scheduled to open in 2018, while an extension of the southeast line deeper into Lone Tree will open the following year.

The opening of the G-Line serving Wheat Ridge and Arvada is on an indefinite delay as RTD officials and its contractor, Denver Transit Partners, try to fix a software glitch with crossing-arm technology that impacts both the G-Line and A-Line.

The R-Line experienced its own delay late last year when RTD said it wouldn’t meet its December opening deadline. But Hogan, Aurora’s mayor, said he would rather have a slight hiccup in the introduction of new rail service than have a line that opens before all issues are worked out.

“I’d rather have a line that opens two months late that works than one that opens on time but still has problems,” he said.