Bacon's Rebellion

Democracy Thrives in Sunlight

Is This Where the Term “Railroaded” Comes From?

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by

James A. Bacon
in

The Rail-to-Dulles heavy rail project looks like it is careening toward disaster. The Fairfax County Board of Supervisors is scheduled to vote June 18 on committing to the first installment of the county’s $900 million share of the project — but it has yet to see a copy of the $2.65 billion construction contract! Worse, the price of the contract is good only through June 19, so the supervisors are under intense pressure not to delay their approval.

A number of the supervisors have said they must see a copy of the contract negotiated between the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority (MWAA) and Dulles Transit Partners, the construction entity, before committing county funds. MWAA representatives insist that they will be able to share the contract before June 18. According to Examiner.com:

“If you want this board to move, we’re going to have access to documents or we’re not going to move,” Connolly told Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority General Counsel Ed Faggen.

But even if the MWAA courier delivers a copy this afternooon, Fairfax supervisors will have less than two weeks to read, digest and debate the merits of what assuredly will be a highly complex document.

Especially outraged are supporters of the underground option: running the heavy rail underneath the Tysons Corner segment instead of down the median of Route 7 (Leesburg Pike), as envisioned in the MWAA contract. Tunnel backers believe an aerial route will destroy a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to re-develop Tysons into a walkable, transit-oriented mixed-use district. A June 18 decision would allow no time to reconsider.

Stewart Schwartz, executive director of the Coalition for Smarter Growth, attended a board hearing yesterday along with hundreds of other citizens to press their case. Said Schwartz: “I am astounded that Fairfax County’s elected officials have not seen the contract yet and that a gun is being held to their heads to vote on June 18th.”

Toot! Toot! Can you hear the sound of citizens getting railroaded?

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11 responses to “Is This Where the Term “Railroaded” Comes From?”

  1. E M Risse Avatar
    E M Risse

    Toot, Toot is right!

    A shared vehicle system in this corridor has been planned for 49 years.

    Let us get it right.

    First there needs to be a concensus on corridor settlement patterns, especially station-area settlement patterns.

    Then we can decide on the vehicle technology to serve that pattern.

    Let us try 21st century technology — See “Rail to Dulles Reality” and “Time to Fundamentally Rethink METRO.”

    Let us also abandon the idea that the only way to evolve functional settlement patterns in the station-areas is to bury the line — See “All Aboard.”

    Toot, Toot is not the sound of inteligent infrastructure investment.

    EMR

  2. Toomanytaxes Avatar
    Toomanytaxes

    Any interesting piece on Dulles rail from Bill Vincent, a former Clinton Administration Transportation official and current general counsel of transportation think tank.

    Dulles Rail Now Most Expensive Transit Line in the Country

    WASHINGTON, June 4, 2007: Dulles Rail is now the most expensive proposed transit line in the nation, based on cost information supplied today by Fairfax County staff to the Board of Supervisors. Dulles Rail beat New York’s Second Avenue Subway for the top spot, yet is projected to carry less than half the passengers and will fail to relieve gridlock on any major roads. County staff briefed the board at the County Government Center in Fairfax this morning.

    “The current plan is a bad deal,” said Bill Vincent, the Deputy Director of the Breakthrough Technologies Institute and a former Clinton Administration official at the US Department of Transportation. “Costs are skyrocketing; citizens will pay more for declining benefits.”

    Vincent noted that the current cost estimate of $5.15 billion is more than triple the estimate provided in 1997, while the anticipated number of daily boardings has declined by nearly 20,000. In February 2007, the US Federal Transit Administration reported that the Wiehle Avenue extension would cost $2.065 billion and would accommodate 69,600 daily passenger trips. Now, just four months later, county staff reported today that the Wiehle Extension will cost $2.65 billion – a nearly $600 million increase – yet will accommodate only 63,000 weekday boardings. “In other words, projected costs have increased nearly 30 percent while projected ridership has declined by nearly 10 percent,” Vincent said. “What’s going on here?”

    As originally presented to the public, the federal government was expected to pay 50 percent of the project costs. Now, the federal share is less than 18 percent, leaving billions of dollars in shortfalls to be paid by citizens in Northern Virginia. “If we pay more, we should get more,” Vincent said. “Instead, we are being handed an under-performing elevated train that most people despise. It’s time to reconsider our options.”

    “The projected ridership for Dulles rail is a drop in the bucket compared with the flood of people heading our way,” Vincent observed. “We ought to build a regional transit network that can serve this growth, rather than wasting our time and resources on a project whose only real distinction is to be the nation’s most expensive and possibly least attractive.”

    The Breakthrough Technologies Institute (BTI) is an independent, non-profit organization that, among other things, promotes sustainable urban transportation solutions.

  3. Larry Gross Avatar
    Larry Gross

    I don’t disagree with many of the criticisms…

    but..”current cost estimate of $5.15 billion is more than triple the estimate provided in 1997″

    and

    …”and will fail to relieve gridlock on any major roads.”

    two things:

    does anyone think that most road projects estimated 10 years ago will be much different in trend – or the twin pinchers of inflation plus scope creep?

    second – do you think that amount of money applied to roads will “relive gridlock” any better?

    For instance, do you think the 700 million for Springfield “relieved gridlock” for the region?

    I have very serious misgivings about the secret PPTA process as well as the concept of using a TOLL road as a cash cow for some other purpose – that may not be cost effective…

    I think that aspect is a better reason for attacking this project…

    but the idea that 5 billion dollars should relieve gridlock in the region – rail or road.. is a much different calculation . .I think

  4. Larry Gross Avatar
    Larry Gross

    wait a minute.

    WaPo sez that taxpayer-paid county staff are PROHIBITED from briefing the BOS on all aspects of the project.

    This is totally bizarre…

    They need to fix this immediately.

    All employee contracts need to be re-written to specify REQUIRE than no employee can enter in a confidentiality agreement with a 3rd party while representing the interests of the county – Period.

    A firing offense.

    This kind of crap is 180 degrees from ethical governance…

    Why would Fairfax let their employees do this in the first place?

  5. Toomanytaxes Avatar
    Toomanytaxes

    Larry, this is all about Gerry Connolly trying to deliver additional zoning density to the big Tysons Corner landowners who are bankrolling his reelection and future campaigns. The trigger for density is the Silver Line. It does make any difference to Connolly what he delivers; how he delivers it; or the what it costs.

    Your mistake, my friend, is that you are presuming this project is a transportation project designed to benefit the public.

  6. Ray Hyde Avatar
    Ray Hyde

    2.065 billion for 63,000 projected weekday boardings. Is that all week, or each day of the week?

    Assume it is 63,000 each day. If each rider pays a buck towards the capital costs, it will take 491 years for the users to pay for this.

    And that is assuming that the dollar in capital costs is in addition to paying the full operating costs, of which metro riders now pay about half.

    We should ask where those people are going, and where they are coming from. It’s a fair bet a good number of them will drive to the metro stations.

    We have thirty years of experience that show us that NEITHER more roads or more transit will relieve gridlock PROVIDED you continue to encourage demand to grow faster than infrastructure by allowing concentrations of employment that cannot be supported.

    Either you will design the way we live to relieve that problem, or you will be faced with massively expensive infrastructure (in the most expensive loccations) to relieve that problem, or you will continue to have that problem and the associated waste.

    Any one of those three answers is going to be expensive.

    Still, maybe 63,000 weekday boardings eliminate 21,000 vehicle trips. If an average trip is 20 miles then it only costs $25 a mile for this reduction – the first year. Looked at that way, maybe it isn’t such a bad deal.

    I still think it might be cheaper to build some office buildings where those people live – and give them away rent free.

  7. Larry Gross Avatar
    Larry Gross

    re: “…Still, maybe 63,000 weekday boardings eliminate 21,000 vehicle trips”

    not just 21K trips (your number) but 21K RUSH HOUR Trips…

    re: origins/destinations

    if we think this rail extension is going to carry 21K rush hour auto trips…

    let me ask… how much would it cost to provide that much road capacity for the same trip?

    Honest Injun.. question..

    Draw a line on a map… better yet.. get a GOOGLE Map and draw the line… sketch in the interchanges…

    figure ..say 25 structures per mile – with say a 25/75 residential/commercial mix.. for right-of-way costs.. then.. figure 50 million plus or minus for each interchange…

    say… this sounds like the ICC…

    piece of cake.. right?

  8. Ray Hyde Avatar
    Ray Hyde

    “let me ask… how much would it cost to provide that much road capacity for the same trip?”

    It isn’t a matter of either, or. The last thirty years has proven that. Take 21,000 vehicles off the road next rush hour, and ask yourself if anyone would even notice. We are going to need BOTH.

    I agree in some places and times rail makes sense. But peak capacity is expensive, road or rail. The more of it you try to put in one place, the more expensive it is.

    I still think it would be cheaper (and faster) to just build the office buildings and give them away. Then the argument about peak capacity at rush hour is moot. We’ve got plenty of peak capacity, but right now it is being (sparsely) used by that guy in Farmville we keep talking about.

  9. Larry Gross Avatar
    Larry Gross

    re: “just build the office buildings and give them away.”

    LOL (laughing out loud)…

    gee.. we’re always talking about paying someone to do something…

    how about we pay them to not drive at rush hour by charging the ones who do want to drive at rush hour?

    We’ll call it the Peter-Paul Congestion Pricing Plan…

    so the boss docks you two hours pay for being 2 hours late – but you get it all back from your share of the tolls for not driving at rush hour…

    or… hey.. what the… you give that money to the boss so he actually makes more money than when you are there…

    you know.. just when it seems all hope is lost … a eureka of an idea comes along…. 🙂

  10. Ray Hyde Avatar
    Ray Hyde

    Building the office buldings and giving them away is paying someone to do what you want: reduce traffic. It is paying them to do something they (apparently) don;t want: to move out of the most congested areas.

    Paying people not to drive at rush hour by charging thse that do, isn’t all that different. It would certainly be a better transfer than charging people who drive at rush hour and giving it to those that ride the rails. How about charging those that ride the rails at rush hour, and giving the money to those that ride off peak?

    Oh, we already do that, and we supplement it with funds from those that drive because they have no accessibility to transit.

    Really, if your alternative is massive road construction, or massive rail construction combined with eternal operating subsidies, then building office buildings and giving them away is dirt cheap by comparison.

    Supposing that the net result is the same in terms of reduced VMT and better in terms of reduced congestion, what would be the real objection? Considering the alternatives, surely you could not atttack this as a government give-away.

  11. Larry Gross Avatar
    Larry Gross

    re: “Building the office buldings and giving them away is paying someone to do what you want: reduce traffic.”

    so .. who would pay for the buildings?

    and where would they be built?

    and what companies would be interested in them if they were not in the location that they wanted to be in?

    I’m sure you have heard of local economic development authorities using tax dollars to build “flex” buildings in taxpayer-bought industrial parks…

    right?

    quess what… in some place – you can’t even give away buildings… because no company wants to be there anyhow…

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