Bacon's Rebellion

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Some Answers, More Questions about the 460 Fiasco

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by

James A. Bacon
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July2014_coverby James A. Bacon

If you’re new to the U.S. 460 Connector controversy and need a primer to bring you up to speed, I’d recommend you read the new Virginia Business cover story written by Paula Squires. She provides an digestible overview of a complex story and advances public understanding with some fresh reporting. In particular, she homes in on a central question for which I have yet to see a clear, concise explanation: How did the Virginia Department of Transportation come to pay $250 million to its public-private partner in the $1.4 billion project, US Mobility Partners, before critical wetlands permits were issued by the Army Corps of Engineers?

Squires does not provide the answer but she gets us closer to the answer. She interviewed Charlie Kilpatrick, the current highway commissioner who was deputy commissioner under the McDonnell administration.

Asked why the state signed off on such a high-risk project, Kilpatrick says, “It was a high risk if a permit was not obtained. When we went to closing [in December 2012], we believed that we had a permittable project.” However, he adds, “It was recognized from the beginning that this was going to be a complex and challenging permitting process.”

As a VDOT veteran, Kilpatrick observes “I don’t know that it has ever happened in Virginia, where a project was not ultimately permitted, after it went through the regulatory steps … I do think we will get a permit.”

According to him, pressure from the McDonnell administration played a role in how the project was handled. “This project was a clear priority of Governor McDonnell,” Kilpatrick says.  “Move it as quickly as possible … Deliver the project. Get it under construction.”

Those were VDOT’s marching orders, he recalls. “VDOT’s job here was to deliver. The project — it complied with the law.”

The state agency began to balk, though, after the original route became questionable last September because of its wetlands impact. The administration wanted to begin right-of-way proceedings and public hearings.

“We said no,” says Kilpatrick. “We’re not going to go out and acquire right of way, because we don’t have a permit … I had the potential of VDOT purchasing land that would not fit with an ultimate road alignment … To have a public hearing on a roadway that may need to shift the alignment, that’s not a prudent thing to do.”

Boiling it down:

In December 2012 VDOT believed that it had a “permittable project.” In other words, there were issues but VDOT believed they could be worked out, as they always had been before. What’s still not clear to me is what happened after December 2012 to disabuse VDOT of the notion that the permitting issues could be resolved within an acceptable time frame. Did some new knowledge come to light? Did the Army Corps of Engineers become more assertive in expressing its concerns? I’m sure the answer is out there, possibly buried in the McAuliffe administration’s internal review. It just hasn’t been brought forth clearly in the media.

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10 responses to “Some Answers, More Questions about the 460 Fiasco”

  1. larryg Avatar
    larryg

    well….. ” “It was a high risk if a permit was not obtained. When we went to closing [in December 2012], we believed that we had a permittable project.” However, he adds, “It was recognized from the beginning that this was going to be a complex and challenging permitting process.”

    I don’t know about others – but this sounds a bit contradictory to me.

    sounds like someone did some arm twisting to get someone to say “yeah, we can get a permit” but in the end …someone put their John Henry on a piece of paper committing Va to the money and the have the CTB sign off on it.

    This causes some of us to wonder if this is how we did the HOT lanes projects also.

    But this is not a new thing either. A few years back, actually a decade or so – area transportation money was committed to a project that not only did not have FHWA approval but had active and unresolved Army Corp AND National Park Service issues – and VDOT continued blithely along as if these issues would fade away as the project “advanced”.

    that project, by the way, failed…after millions had been spent on it.

    at no point in that process did VDOT show any inclination to alter their preferred route and NPS and ACE showed no inclination to give in and ultimately FHWA refused to issue a decision.

    No – new-location road-building is easy anymore. It’s enormously difficult and if VDOT did not go all-in – they’d lose. It’s a high wire act.

    there is also an honest question about US 460. If we were going to try to build I-64 east these days – would it be permittable or would it run into the same problems?

    why is that important? well… because even Aubrey Lane and McAuliffe thing the CONCEPT of the road is valid and important and of value to the state and actually say they want to find a way to get it built – as opposed to calling it a boondoggle that is dead and over with.

  2. TMT Avatar
    TMT

    Nobody howled when VDOT and DRPT kept pushing for Dulles Rail, Phase 1 when everyone knew it didn’t meet federal standards for funding. What is the difference? To me, any project done for economic development reasons should suspect from Day 1.

    1. larryg Avatar
      larryg

      apples and oranges TMT.

      Highways don’t have a Federal standard for funding similar to Metro. If they did, many highways would fail to pass muster.

      and second, METRO does not seem to run into wetland permit issues and the like… which if you wanted to compare apples to apples -you’d be comparing METRO getting permits from resource agencies vs VDOT doing that.

      As far as I know -there are no FTA-like “rules” for roads…

      Virginia is just getting into a prioritization scheme and North Carolina is further along – but word is that the NC process is already running into trouble with the rural areas who claim the urban areas are favored by the rules.

    2. Tysons Engineer Avatar
      Tysons Engineer

      But it did meet federal standards for funding, once it was split from Ph2. I’m not sure what you are saying here, considering 900 million in funds were provided.

      The issue was the original analysis was undertaken under a republican president, and I dont think you understand how stupidly backwards the GOP is on anything that isn’t a new build highway now and days.

      GW Bush was the reason silver line wasnt going to happen, and it has nothing to do with the worth of the project, and everything to do with who donates money to the GOP in terms of industries and that the project was for a very liberal part of a battleground state.

      1. TMT Avatar
        TMT

        TE – Dulles Rail, Phase 1 did not meet the grandfathered standards for receiving federal funding. Why, because it did not deliver sufficient reduction in auto traffic (new passenger count) for the cost to build the project. That is a fact. Virginia politicians, both Republicans and Democrats, lobbied the Bush Administration, DoT and FTA, until it caved and agreed to the federal funding. But that still doesn’t mean the project meets federal standards. It doesn’t.

        But the Tysons landowners had so much at stake (the added density) they bought off Virginia’s politicians. The Silver Line is a transfer of wealth from the Dulles Toll Road drivers and the American taxpayers to Tysons landowners, many of whom gave huge amounts of money to Tim Kaine, who , as you know, gave away the DTR to MWAA.

        All of the data show that the added density triggered by the Silver Line, even after mixed use development, bike paths and sidewalks will drive SOV traffic higher, causing total failure at 84 MSF.

        And, at least in McLean, more Democrats opposed the construction of the elevated line than supported it. John Foust’s 2007 voter poll showed a majority wanted no line at all if an elevated line was the only alternative. The Silver Line was constructed to benefit the Tysons landowners and Bechtel. Those are the facts.

    3. DJRippert Avatar
      DJRippert

      The difference is that VDOT and DRPT didn’t end up with nothing built and a quarter of a billion dollars spent. If Rt 460 had spent $15M or maybe even $50M and then gone bust – that might have been OK. But $250M before the first shovel hit the ground? Are you kidding me? At $200 / hr that’s over 600 person years of effort. Where were these people and what were they doing to incur a quarter billion in costs.

      This thing stinks to high heaven.

      1. TMT Avatar
        TMT

        The big problem is that government has too much money and it and its hangers on begin to think the money belongs to them. And we have the morons at the WaPo who cheer this kind of crap.

        Read the article in the July 7 BusinessWeek, at page 23. It discusses the huge drop in the airfreight industry and its very slow recovery. Yet, the Virginia-way people want to take taxpayer money and build a road to connect with the backside of Dulles Airport to stimulate the airfreight business at the Airport. Jack Potter has revenue and cost problems at Dulles. His solution – take taxpayer money and build a road.

        Virginia should open an office of Devils Advocate, whose job is to challenge the dumb-ass spending ideas proposed in the Commonwealth. It would pay for itself in three months.

  3. TMT Avatar
    TMT

    Larry, the Silver Line traverses a number of Resource Protection Areas that were addressed in the Final EIS. Here is some of the text.

    “The long-term effects to water resources from the proposed implementation of the No Build Alternative and the full LPA are discussed below. Long-term effects are those that would permanently alter the
    hydrology and function of the water resource. For example, excavating a floodplain would permanently alter its ability to attenuate floodwater; filling a wetland would permanently alter its hydrology and its ability
    to function as a wetland. Furthermore, failure to control stormwater and sediments from a construction site could permanently affect water quality and function of a water resource.

    “In compliance with Federal and state regulations, efforts were made to avoid impacts to wetland systems and floodplains. In several cases, station facilities and/or the alignment were shifted to avoid or minimize their effect on several wetlands and/or floodplains. In areas where impacts are unavoidable, appropriate and practicable compensatory mitigation would be implemented.”

    Doesn’t sound much different than a road in terms of impact. The same section discusses the permits needed for construction.

    1. Tysons Engineer Avatar
      Tysons Engineer

      Except read what it actually says. The stations (of which there really is only one near a waterbody which is McLean station) were relocated to avoid impact to wetland systems. In the case of 460 there is no realignment option so far, they simply thought they could steam roll the corps.

    2. larryg Avatar
      larryg

      I guess I’m not buying that an elevated track is going to do the same level of impact that a road would but in terms of passing muster on economic benefit we don’t have a a real way to do that for roads or rail.

      The one for subway is somewhat esoteric in that it basically seeks to play off cost verses ridership, if not mistaken.

      I don’t think the average person understands it at all.

      it’s no better with 460. How are you really going to judge that road on economic benefit in a way that is understandable and convincing?

      both the road and the rail are basically esoteric bureaucratic hand waving.

      I will say this.

      I’ve been reading some interesting papers put out by the folks at the Virginia Center for Transportation Innovation & Research on early road history:

      http://vtrc.virginiadot.org/PubDetails.aspx?PubNo=11-R18

      and the whole idea of roads being created in 1607-1800 was about being able to conduct commerce… to move goods to market.

      so there were real economic benefits and property owners actually competed against each other trying to convince the counties to build a road near their property – and instead of monetary taxes – they were built by all “tithe-able” citizens who were required to work 6 days a year on roads.

      unlike today, there were few, if any folks, who opposed roads – the only issue was how they would be paid for!

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