That's the unlikely new motto for the Salt Lake Chamber, whose president and CEO, Lane Beattie, says raising $900 million to speed up construction of four planned TRAX extensions is key to Utah's economic future.

If the money can be found, construction on the new TRAX lines could begin next year and all trains could be running by 2015 instead of 2030, says a new business-led coalition, the 2015 Transportation Alliance, formed to accelerate transportation investment in Utah.

"You've never seen the Chamber of Commerce come out on an issue as big as transportation for the state of Utah," Beattie said. "The business community for too long has been too silent. We have got to have new funding."

By early May, the chamber will have a report from consultants charged with analyzing what would happen to Utah business if the four TRAX lines aren't built before 2030, which is the target under current funding. While he doesn't know what the results will be, Beattie, the former Utah Senate president, already is pointing to a range of taxes that could feed the Utah Transit Authority projects.

The suggestions include new or increased gas taxes, sales taxes on fuel, impact fees, property and sales taxes and special improvement district levies.

"We're just trying to be forward-thinking so we can act instead of react," Beattie said. "It may cost us a little today to solve these problems instead of a lot in the future."

Justin Jones, UTA spokesman, said transit agency officials were pleasantly surprised when Beattie and other business leaders approached them a few months ago with their proposals.

"We've never had this. The business community has been behind the scenes," Jones said. "For them to come out so forcefully for transit is . . . really a shift in thinking."

UTA gets no money from the state; rather, it is run as a local government special service district akin to a water agency or mosquito abatement district. The Legislature enacts bills allowing local government to create such districts and tells them how much they can tax residents to support the districts.

Currently, the limit is a half-cent in sales tax. Only Davis and Weber counties collect that much for transit. Utah, Tooele and Box Elder counties collect one-fourth cent in sales tax for transit. Salt Lake County has a half-cent sales tax, but one-16th of a cent of that goes to road improvements.

UTA has approached Salt Lake County officials about floating a general obligation bond for transit needs, but as yet there's no concrete proposal..

The chamber has strong allies in the Wasatch Front Regional Council, the Mountainland Association of Governments and the Salt Lake County Association of Governments. All are in favor of finding money for the speed-up.

Beattie said Salt Lake needs to be able to compete with Denver and Phoenix for new businesses and conferences. Those two cities have approved 1-cent sales tax increases to fund transit, and use their 2016 rail-line completion dates as a sales tool.

The 2015 Transportation Alliance says Utah will become ever less competitive as the population and travel demand increase to the point that hours wasted in traffic will triple. The alliance says TRAX and other public transit carries about 20 percent of weekday work trips to downtown Salt Lake City, equivalent to one lane of traffic on Interstate 15.