Category: CSG in the News

The Purple Line Finally Gets Some Good News

Posted on by Jason Adle

After two rulings that have resulted in a year of delays for the Purple Line, backers of the light rail project have finally gotten a break.

An appeals court ruled Wednesday that Maryland can continue working on the project even as a lawsuit continues, overturning a lower court decision that put work on ice. Most critically, it means that the state can pursue hundreds of millions of dollars in federal funding for the project, which would connect 16 miles between Bethesda and New Carrollton.

“The order will allow construction to commence and we will continue to do everything we possibly can to keep the Purple Line moving forward,” Maryland State Attorney Brian Frosh said yesterday.

Republican Governor Larry Hogan gave the project a surprise green light two years ago. Construction was slated to begin in late 2016 on the 16.2-mile light rail line. It would be run by the Maryland Transit Administration, not Metro, though there are connections to the Red, Green, and Orange lines along some of the 21 stops.

But it has faced fierce opposition from an organized group of neighbors, who at one point considered focusing their fight on the environmental impact to a tiny, shrimp-like creature.

Instead, they’ve had successes arguing that transit officials failed to sufficiently account for the impact of Metro’s safety and ridership issues. A U.S. District Court judge ruled in August of 2016 that the MTA needed to re-do its ridership calculations. This May, the same judge said that the state hadn’t sufficiently completed a “hard look” at the issues posed by WMATA and ordered additional study.

The project’s backers worried that it could mean the end of the line for the Purple Line, as it put already appropriated federal funds in jeopardy and meant the state couldn’t proceed on work or seek more federal funding.

Yesterday’s ruling overturned the 2016 decision, and reinstated the Purple Line’s federal environmental approval.

“The Purple Line is essential for access to jobs, for revitalization inside the Beltway, and for providing a transportation and smart growth option that will reduce greenhouse gas emissions,” said Stewart Schwartz, the executive director of the Coalition for Smarter Growth. “We hope this means that the full funding grant agreement can be executed and funding flow to the project.”

The Department of Transportation will now determine if there is enough certainty to sign a funding agreement and begin dispensing the hundreds of millions of federal dollars that have already been appropriated.

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Planners Back Study For Another Potomac River Bridge — Again

Posted on by Jason Adle

As long as traffic congestion remains of one the Washington area’s most vexing problems, the idea of building another Potomac River bridge may be the most divisive potential solution, guaranteed to spur contention whenever it resurfaces in ongoing efforts to improve regional mobility.

This was in evidence on Wednesday, when the National Capital Region Transportation Planning Board (TPB) voted to include the bridge idea on a list of 10 major highway, transit, and land use initiatives warranting further study to assess their possible benefits to the region’s transportation system.

During the two-hour TPB meeting, the bridge was the only issue debated, completely overshadowing the other projects to be studied, including toll lanes on the rest of the Beltway, I-270, Dulles Toll Road, and Route 50; bus rapid transit in Montgomery and Prince George’s Counties and Northern Virginia; free public transit rides for poor residents; and placing more offices and housing near undeveloped Metrorail stations.

While no specific location for a new span was decided upon, some officials on the northern side of the Potomac condemned the possibility that it could be built upriver from the American Legion Bridge, connecting Rt. 28 in Virginia to the I-270 corridor in Maryland through Montgomery County’s agricultural reserve.

 

Montgomery County Council member Marc Elrich, who represents his county at the TPB, proposed removing the bridge study from the final list of initiatives but his amendment failed to garner adequate support. On Tuesday, the County Council unanimously passed a resolution to oppose another study.

Indeed, opponents argued on Wednesday that the idea already has been studied for decades by both Democratic and Republican administrations in Virginia, who repeatedly failed to convince their neighbors in Maryland to support such a project.

And a recent study, which focused not on a new span but instead on traffic and transit volumes at 11 existing Potomac River crossings, cast doubt on the potential benefits of building another bridge upriver from the hopelessly congested American Legion Bridge.

The study by the Virginia Department of Transportation concluded in 2015 that extending toll lanes across the American Legion to I-270 “be the top priority for addressing western Potomac River crossings,” although the recommendations did “not eliminate the benefits of a future ‘outer crossing’ to address the needs for interconnectivity/crossing the Potomac River.”

The conclusion was based on research that showed only a fraction of cars crossing the American Legion Bridge during rush hour originated from western Loudoun and Fairfax Counties with destinations, after crossing the river, to the north and west.

More study to come

Mountains of past studies notwithstanding, the Transportation Planning Board’s staff and consultants will take another look at it. To supporters, it is a no-brainer: a region expecting another million residents in the coming decades needs more ways to cross the Potomac.

Evan Pritchard, the executive director of the Northern Virginia Transportation Alliance, said the region should have built multiple bridges across the Potomac decades ago to avoid the current traffic quagmire.

“The need for additional river crossing north of the American Legion Bridge is as apparent today as it was half a century ago,” Pritchard said in testimony to the TPB.

To opponents, another bridge would pave the way to more suburban sprawl, minimal congestion relief, and drain finite dollars away from more pressing transportation needs, including Metro.

Stewart Schwartz, the head of the Coalition for Smarter Growth which opposes major highway projects, said the region’s future lies in public transportation.

“If you build it, you will certainly induce new land use in those outer areas that will induce more traffic, and you will be left with a new crowded bridge plus an old crowded American Legion Bridge,” said Schwartz, who said the idea of ‘outer beltway’ belongs in the 1950s.

After studying the 10 initiatives for next few months, the TPB is expected by the end of 2017 to decide which ones should be added to the region’s long-range transportation plan, likely provoking another public debate like the one that engulfed Wednesday’s meeting.

But TPB chair Bridget Donnell Newton, the mayor of Rockville, sought to refute the notion that Marylanders have made up their minds. She called on officials on both sides of the river to approach the study with an open mind.

“It behooves us to take off our parochial hats, put on our regional hats, and work together,” she said. “It is difficult for people to do that. Sometimes it is because we become entrenched in our decisions and we don’t want to hear new information.”

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Transportation Planning Board will study new crossing over the Potomac

Posted on by Jason Adle

WASHINGTON — Over strong objections from Maryland, Montgomery County and other leaders, the region’s Transportation Planning Board voted Wednesday to study a new Potomac River crossing north of the Beltway’s Legion Bridge.

It is part of a broader effort to identify big-ticket, regionwide projects that could improve the region’s terrible traffic.

Virginia business groups, AAA Mid-Atlantic and groups that generally lobby for increased road construction across the region spoke in support of the additional Potomac crossing, which has been considered for years.

Speaking against it were environmental groups; groups that support transit options; the Coalition for Smarter Growth; and representatives from Montgomery County, Prince George’s County and the state of Maryland.

“A northern crossing is antithetical to everything our county, and I believe our region, is committed to: smart growth, environmental stewardship, preservation of agricultural lands, and greenhouse gas reductions,” said Montgomery County Council President Roger Berliner during a public comment period.

‘We need real solutions’

“We need real solutions to address [terrible traffic], not fantasy solutions that will never happen — I repeat — never happen. And, just as importantly, [that] don’t truly contribute to solving the problem,” Berliner said.

Berliner cited Virginia Department of Transportation studies that found most drivers on the congested Legion Bridge are going to or from a point near the Beltway.

He and his Montgomery County Council colleagues support a greater focus on toll lanes along I-270 that would connect across a widened Legion Bridge to the I-495 Express Lanes in Virginia.

Expanding toll lanes even more to cover the entire Beltway as well as other roads like U.S. 50 is a separate part of the 10-item proposal.

Transportation Planning Board Staff Director Kanti Srikanth said that toll and express bus expansion is based on the idea that most highways around the region are “hopelessly congested” at rush hour.

Supporters of an additional bridge crossing argue it could be built along with improvements to the Legion Bridge and that it could provide an important backup option in the event of any issues.

“I hope that we don’t go another 10, 20, 50 years without looking at filling the missing gaps in our transportation system in this region,” said Loudoun County Supervisor Ron Meyer. “This has been a missing gap for 70 years. Our role as the Transportation Planning Board is to look at long-term plans, so talking about who’s governor now for the next year … it’s not a part of the conversation we’re having … we have to look long term here.”

Prince William County Supervisor and Northern Virginia Transportation Authority Chairman Marty Nohe supported keeping the outer crossing on the list of projects for further study because the list is expected to be narrowed down in December based on preliminary analysis.

“If in fact this project is so terrible, if it really is that bad, then the analysis will prove that and Ron and I will look really stupid,” Nohe said. “But I don’t know that yet because I don’t have the analysis yet.”

While the plan does not provide a specific location for the bridge, the expected location is between Virginia State Route 28 near Dulles Town Center and somewhere just across the river in Maryland that would allow for the construction of a highway connection to Gaithersburg.

Montgomery County Councilmember Marc Elrich, who unsuccessfully moved to remove the outer crossing from the board’s analysis, said there is no money or political will to pave over parts of Montgomery County’s agricultural reserve.

Montgomery County and the state of Maryland have consistently opposed the idea of a bridge, but would be responsible for much of the cost because the river is technically controlled by Maryland.

“Why would we put this into something to study? I would not do this to any other jurisdiction,” Elrich said. “For a lot of us, this is just a bridge too far.”

Concerns over who benefits

Prince George’s County Councilmember Dannielle Glaros expressed concerns that the project would only help Fairfax, Loudoun or Prince William counties rather than serving as the type of regional project the TPB is hoping to champion under this new aspirational section of the region’s long-range plan.

“It really talks about a narrow portion of the region … that has been the most-favored region, and could actually exasperate the east-west divide that clearly exists in our region,” Glaros said.

“I wish I could take you all out to Sterling and Herndon, Virginia, and walk you through those neighborhoods where we just had a young girl killed by an MS-13 gang member, and you can walk those neighborhoods and tell me that we don’t need economic empowerment in those neighborhoods,” Loudoun County Supervisor Ron Meyer responded.

“If you want to empower Sterling, empower Herndon, empower one of the most economically depressed areas in our region, this bridge would be the No. 1 thing that could do it, that could give them access to jobs and give jobs access to them.”

Arlington County Board Chair Jay Fisette reminded the board that it has no real power to force even the plans that are ultimately selected as priorities, but he hopes regional agreement and pressure could lead to changes that cut down on traffic issues.

“Nothing we do … can require any jurisdiction to alter any existing or future plans … we don’t have the authority to do it,” Fisette said. “We do have the authority to say no to a project.”

Fauquier County Supervisor Peter Schwartz worries that the analysis that will be done over the next few months may not show the true impacts of some of the proposals because planners have struggled to accurately project how the addition of a new road or transit project would change people’s choices and habits.

“That future behavior has always sunk all of our projects by overwhelming the additional capacity because it led people to change,” Schwartz said.

He worries that means people will read the analysis to support pre-existing views on certain projects like the outer crossing.

“It will be the same food fight that it’s been every time it’s come up in the past, and was frankly evidenced by the public comments and some of the discussion that’s gone on today,” Schwartz said.

Hopes for wide-ranging solutions

As the list is narrowed down, business groups hope for wide-ranging solutions.

“The Express Lanes travel network, the commuter and Metro rail enhancements, and a northern bridge crossing will serve as major opportunities for our region to preserve and attract talent and business,” said Northern Virginia Chamber of Commerce vice president Mike Forehand. “It’s our hope that further study will beget action, as we do not have time to wait.

Whatever options are chosen, Metro planner Shyam Kannan emphasized that the region’s existing issues need to be addressed first.

“Before we get ahead of ourselves and start to think about these wonderful things that could make this region much more mobile, I think it’s important to remember … we can’t even begin to think about these things until we resolve the funding crisis that is WMATA,” Kannan said.

“We are beyond levels of incredulity with regard to the conversation. The Board discussion last week … involved essentially trying to raise money by holding bake sales at Metro parking lots on Thanksgiving. We are scraping the bottom of the barrel. That’s how bad it’s gotten.”

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A New Potomac River Bridge? Same Old Argument

Posted on by Jason Adle

An old transportation idea is back, and it remains as divisive as ever.

On Wednesday, the National Capital Region Transportation Planning Board is scheduled to decide whether to include a proposed new Potomac River bridge among nine other major transportation projects on a list for further consideration.

Studied and debated for decades, the idea to build a new span west of the congested American Legion Bridge, is again splitting officials on either side of the river who have different visions of improving regional mobility.

In Virginia, some public officials and business interests are calling for another study of a bridge that could connect Rt. 28 in Virginia to Maryland. In Maryland, key decision makers remain steadfastly against even studying, let alone building, a multi-billion dollar bridge.

The mere presence of a bridge study on the planning board’s agenda spurred the Montgomery County Council to unanimously approve a resolution on Tuesday condemning the idea.

The county opposes building a new span west of American Legion Bridge for several reasons, according to Council President Roger Berliner: First, the bridge would land in an agriculture reserve; second, it would contradict the county’s smart growth principles, and third, it would drain state transportation dollars from more pressing priorities, namely WMATA.

“We do have real problems with congestion. We need real solutions, not fantasy bridges that will never happen,” said Berliner, who said the idea has been studied many times over the years, most recently in 2014. Virginia shut down that study because Maryland officials remained opposed to the bridge concept amid disagreements over its actual congestion-relief benefits.

“It should not be studied for another nanosecond,” Berliner said.

Bob Buchanan, a real estate developer and president of The 2030 Group whose members include regional business leaders, said it would be wrong to dismiss the potential benefits of a new bridge for regional mobility and the economy.

“It’s really a shame that one jurisdiction wants to hold the rest of the region hostage to its political views,” said Buchanan, who said business leaders in Montgomery County may differ from the stance of their elected leaders.

“Let’s study and understand what our options are. I think it would be unwise not to do that. Our congestion is getting worse,” said Buchanan, who said Metro’s troubles have received attention disproportionate to its importance to ordinary commuters.

Metro “constitutes less than 20 percent of all our daily trips. No one is talking about some of the big regional priorities when it comes to roads.”

In a news release, the Coalition for Smarter Growth, which derisively calls the bridge idea an “outer beltway,” criticized Buchanan and other real estate developers for lobbying for new road construction to open up rural land to development.

“The upper Potomac Bridge and other segments of an outer beltway are back, as a result of the latest multimillion dollar lobbying campaign that began back in 2010,” said the coalition’s executive director Stewart Schwartz in the statement.

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Isiah Leggett’s signature plan for Shady Grove is less lucrative than promised

Posted on by Jason Adle

The idea was ambitious when Montgomery County Executive Isiah Leggett pitched it in 2008: transform 90 acres of county-owned industrial land at the Red Line’s Shady Grove terminus into a transit-friendly urban village.

Leggett’s Smart Growth Initiative would be a break-even proposition for taxpayers over time, he said, and might even make money as the county got an attractive new residential neighborhood and replaced outdated warehouses and garages with state-of-the-art facilities elsewhere.

But nearly a decade in, as Leggett (D) nears the end of his 12-year tenure, this signature project has not gone forward as expected. Only a fraction of the money anticipated from land sales to private developers has been paid so far. And the county’s difficulty in finding a new site for a school system bus depot has slowed progress on a major portion of the planned Shady Grove community, including a new park and elementary school.

Critics on the Montgomery County Council say Leggett overpromised and underdelivered, adding to the county’s $3.2 billion debt by borrowing against land sales proceeds that have yet to materialize.

“This is just not a good news story,” said Council President Roger Berliner (D-Potomac-Bethesda), one of three council incumbents running for county executive in the 2018 Democratic primary.

But Leggett says he devised a creative way to replace outdated buildings and pursue transit-
oriented development policies far more quickly, and effectively, than had been done in the past. Even his own staff was skeptical, he recalled in an interview.

“I was the sole person who believed we could move all these pieces,” he said. “You can argue that a few dollars didn’t come in at the precise time. . . . The county comes out far ahead in the long term.”

In Leggett’s calculus, proceeds from land sales to private developers, along with fresh tax revenue from the new construction, would eventually pay for relocating and rebuilding outdated facilities in Shady Grove and elsewhere. There would also be savings from exiting costly leases the county was paying to rent some of the old structures.

After nearly a decade, parts of that vision have been realized. Along Crabbs Branch Way, within walking distance of the Shady Grove Metro station, the first of a planned 400 new townhouses and 1,100 apartments — some subsidized, some market-rate — are sprouting up where a school system food distribution center, a liquor warehouse and maintenance garages for Ride On buses once stood.

Those facilities and others, including the police and fire training academy, have been successfully moved and rebuilt on other county land.

But those relocations got more expensive as the county expanded the scope of the projects and made state-of-the-art improvements.

Changes in menus and increased emphasis on fresh food, for example, added $9 million to the $35 million school center. Advances in training methods raised the police and fire academy price tag by $15 million, to $63.1 million. All told, the cost of the replacement buildings increased by $60.8 million.

At the same time, Leggett narrowed the county’s expected revenue stream by changing Montgomery’s original agreement with EYA, developer of the townhouses and apartments on the west side of Crabbs Branch. The county initially expected to collect $103.8 million from EYA in fiscal 2015, according to a 2012 fiscal summary drawn up by Leggett’s office. But Leggett decided to allow EYA to pay incrementally as portions of the 45-acre site were built, in order “to help them with their cash flow.”

To date, the county has collected slightly more than $2 million from EYA, which has completed about a quarter of the Westside at Shady Grove project. On the other side of the ledger, the county has benefited from $19 million worth of roads and other infrastructure built by the company. It also credited the company with $4.5 million in exchange for building additional affordable and workforce housing.

 

Leggett has also strategically held certain parcels of county land back from the open market, believing that waiting will result in a better deal.

Five years ago, Montgomery struck an agreement with the developer Hines to convert the old public safety training academy on Great Seneca Highway in Gaithersburg into a life-sciences complex with companies and housing. Leggett placed the $70 million project on hold in hopes of luring a major cybersecurity center to the 50-acre site. That possibility is now less likely. The project has been placed back out for rebidding.

Most vexing for Leggett has been the difficulty in finding a new location for 400 county school buses kept in a 35-acre depot opposite the new townhouses on Crabbs Branch Way. The county agreed in 2012 to sell the land for $70 million to developers LCOR and NVR.

An initial plan to put some of the buses at the Carver Educational Services Center on Hungerford Drive drew sharp neighborhood opposition. Compounding the issue is overcrowding at all five MCPS bus depots. With no obvious available option, Leggett this spring ordered a study before he decides what to do about the Shady Grove depot. It is likely to delay development by 12 to 18 months more, at least, he said.

Council member George Leventhal (D-At Large) said it was “not good planning” to jump into the development venture without knowing where the depot would be moved.

“I don’t think it’s something we can foist on a community just to transform a Metro station,” said Leventhal, also a candidate to succeed Leggett as county executive.

The Shady Grove initiative has generated an unexpected level of debt. Most big capital improvements, such as roads and schools, are financed through the sale of general obligation bonds, where principal and interest are usually paid off over 20 years. But the Leggett administration, interested in moving quickly and anticipating that land sales proceeds would soon be in hand, kept the smart-growth projects out of the capital budget, opting instead to use $200 million in short-term loans on which it paid only interest. Such interim financing is meant to be retired quickly, to avoid added expense for taxpayers. But the county is still carrying a balance of about $160 million.

“These are hard decisions,” said council member Marc Elrich (D-At Large), another county executive candidate. “It was somewhat of a gamble, and it hasn’t turned out entirely the way everybody thought it would turn out.”

Looking for funds to pay off some of the debt, Montgomery officials announced last month that they may use the $22 million netted from settlement of the county’s lawsuit against the designer and builders of the Silver Spring Transit Center.

The county could also sell more bonds to convert the debt from short-term to long-term. But that would crowd out other construction projects in the capital budget, which caps new bond debt at $340 million annually.

Stewart Schwartz, executive director of the Coalition for Smarter Growth, and the region’s leading advocate for building most densely around mass transit, said despite the financial issues, the long-term benefits to the county remain significant.

“Given the growth that’s coming to the region,” he said, “the county needs to take as many opportunities like this as possible, so we don’t choke on our traffic.”

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Almost everyone agrees WMATA needs funding

Posted on by Jacob Korn

Momentum is growing for dedicated revenue, and possibly associated reforms, for the struggling Metro system. A group of 21 business associations issued a statement last week calling for action to save Metro. So did 18 nonprofit organizations. And so have five local faith-based organizing groups and Metro’s largest union.

Will legislators follow?

The faith-based push came from the Industrial Areas Foundation, a network of local faith-based and community organizations each of which has a clever acronym: Washington Interfaith Network (WIN), Action in Montgomery (AIM), Baltimoreans United in Leadership Development (BUILD), People Acting Together in Howard (PATH), and Virginians Organized for Interfaith Community Engagements (VOICE). The five IAF affiliates teamed up with ATU Local 689 to push for $1 billion a year in new dedicated funding for Metro.

Last week, the Federal City Council, a DC-based group of business leaders, teamed up with the Greater Washington Board of Trade, five other business groups, and 14 chambers of commerce to issue a letter calling for ongoing funding and reforms. In addition to “multi-year commitments … for operating funds,” “a dedicated source for capital funding,” and “a continuing funding commitment from the federal government,” the business letter asks for reforms to WMATA’s governance, in line with what the Federal City Council has been pushing for. (Disclosure: FCC’s deputy director and leader on Metro, Emeka Moneme, is a member of the GGWash Board of Directors).

The business letter recommends shrinking the number of directors on the board, requiring expertise in a relevant field, and a rule that the “sole fiduciary duty” of board members be to WMATA. People have criticized the way members sometimes push for procurements or real estate deals which benefit their particular jurisdictions, and even create opportunities for corruption. It’s likely that elected officials, which make up some of DC’s and Virginia’s board members (but not Maryland’s, per state law) would not be able to sit on the board under such a rule.

Besides the chambers of commerce of DC, Virginia, Northern Virginia, Arlington County, Prince William, Greater Springfield, Greater Reston, Greater McLean, Maryland, Montgomery County, Prince George’s, Greater Bethesda, Greater Silver Spring, and the Greater Washington Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, other signatories to the letter include 2030 Group, the Apartment and Office Building Association, the Consortium of Universities, and the DC Building Industry Association.

Nonprofit organizations, including many that work on transportation and the environment, have teamed up as well with their own statement. Led by the Coalition for Smarter Growth, they endorsed a “fund it, fix it” statement of principles which calls for dedicated funding, frequent transit service, and bus priority with dedicated bus lanes where possible.

That group includes Maryland organizations CASA, Action Committee for Transit, the Maryland Center on Economic Policy, League of Women Voters Montgomery County, Friends of White Flint, and the Montgomery Countryside Alliance; the Virginia Conservation Network, Northern Virginia Affordable Housing Alliance, Piedmont Environmental Council, Fairfax Advocates for Better Bicycling, and the Arlington Coalition for Sensible Transportation; the Sierra Club chapters and groups in DC, Virginia, Montgomery County, and Great Falls; the Chesapeake Bay Foundation and Washington Area Bicyclist Association.

The League of Women Voters of the National Capital Area (an umbrella group of all LWVs in the area), 1000 Friends of Maryland, and Central Maryland Transportation Alliance also joined for an announcement issued Monday from the nonprofits.

In the public sector, there have been funding calls and reform plans from WMATA General Manager Paul Wiedefeld, a group of Maryland legislators, ATU Local 689, and a working group from the Council of Governments.

Who’s not here?

At this point, with advocacy, environmental, business, faith, and about every other policy organization in DC, Maryland, and Virginia agreeing about much of what WMATA needs, the question becomes, who’s not on board?

So far, some Virginia legislators still aren’t. Some in Loudoun County still want more study and feel Loudoun shouldn’t have to pay even more after just joining WMATA formally (and not even having any stations yet). It’s sort of like buying into a condo and then being hit with a big assessment to fix the roof. But is the alternative to let the roof collapse?

Loudoun may try to negotiate a different funding commitment, and that’s really up to Virginia to work out internally. One way or another, though, Metro needs funding and appropriate reform.

Virginia legislators outside Northern Virginia may be the toughest sell, as many downstate delegates don’t ride transit and have signed anti-tax pledges which include not allowing Northern Virginia to raise its own taxes, even if there’s no impact outside the region.

Maryland Governor Larry Hogan has said he won’t stand in the way of Montgomery and Prince George’s counties taxing themselves to fund Metro, but won’t help out of the state budget. This despite pulling money away from those counties to build more roads in rural parts of the state right after taking office. The Baltimore area, which was most robbed by Hogan’s cancellation of the Red Line, may want to know how it can fund needed transit as well.

But whether it’s a 1% sales tax or another method; whatever deal has to be worked out with the rest of Virginia and Maryland; the calls within all quarters of our region for some action to save Metro are getting louder and louder. The need is clear.

Click here to read the original story.

Nonprofit groups say Metro needs dedicated funding before next fiscal year, even if labor, governance reforms have to wait

Posted on by Jason Adle

More than a dozen nonprofit organizations are backing the call for dedicated funding for Metro — and soon — saying that without it, the system risks further deterioration and drastic service cuts.

The 18 groups say they are aligning with the region’s business community to secure reliable, bondable annual funding stream for Metro, which stands alone among large subway systems in its lack of a significant source of dedicated funding. Business leaders from 21 regional chambers of commerce and employers’ groups issued a plea last week for dedicated funding and a restructuring of the system’s governing board.

Now, the nonprofits are adding their voice to the mix — highlighting the system’s importance to the region and the potential for further service reductions as key considerations in the fight. The groups, including the Coalition for Smarter Growth, the Sierra Club and the League of Women Voters, released a Statement of Principles in March endorsing dedicated funding and calling Metro “crucial for the economic health and sustainability” of the region.

“Going ahead, it’s gonna take both the business community, with their clout, and the nonprofit community, with our membership, to keep this focus on saving Metro and to win the funding the system needs,” said Stewart Schwartz, executive director of the Coalition for Smarter Growth, which is leading the nonprofit groups’ charge.

The nonprofits break from the business groups and some political officials, however, by eschewing immediate calls for an overhaul to the system’s governing board, though they support structural reforms. Schwartz said the Coalition for Smarter Growth is awaiting the release of a fall study by former transportation secretary Ray LaHood, which is expected to include recommendations on the system’s governance.

Metro General Manager Paul J. Wiedefeld has asked for $15.5 billion over 10 years for capital needs — including $500 million in new dedicated funding annually — and concessions from the transit agency’s unions. Wiedefeld also broadly supports the demand that board members have a singular fiduciary duty to the transit system, which business groups and some officials have called for.

Republicans in Virginia have said any increases in funding should be tied to labor and governance reforms.

“The one thing we don’t want to see is we don’t want to see political gridlock over structural and governance issues that end up delaying or endangering the additional funding the system needs,” Schwartz said.

The nonprofits say state and local jurisdictions should prevent Metro from falling into a “death spiral” by providing the funding it needs and ensuring frequent and reliable service. Budget woes, stemming partly from lower-than-expected ridership, forced Metro to raise rail and bus fares and reduce service frequency on five of six lines beginning this week.

Nancy Soreng, co-chair of a Metro working group of the League of Women Voters of the National Capital Area, said it’s up to regional leaders to determine how to reform the system’s governance and labor but that funding can’t wait.

“The most urgent thing for us is to get the three jurisdictions to agree on a dedicated funding source,” she said. As for structural reforms: “That’s a battle that we’re going to stay out of, and we’re going to let the politicians sort that out.”

Soreng was quick to note that the League of Women Voters has endorsed a sales tax for Metro since at least 1980, as the group’s website reflects.

“A sales tax which excludes such necessities as food and medicines would be the best means of financing mass transportation in the metropolitan area,” it points out. A regionwide sales tax, endorsed by a technical panel of the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments, is among the funding mechanisms regional leaders are weighing. Soreng said her group is open to other means of raising the money if the region can agree on them.

The Coalition for Smarter Growth stopped short of advocating a specific funding mechanism.

“We believe that the jurisdictions should commit to a level of funding and then find the mechanisms that work best for each of them,” Schwartz said.

The nonprofits are calling for dedicated funding to be established by the conclusion of the fiscal year next June.

“Waiting any longer means that capital costs could rise, you could fall further behind in the capital restoration in the system,” Schwartz said. “The operating gap could increase further, and there could be more service cuts.”

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Bus lanes coming to 16th Street, but it could cost you some parking

Posted on by Jacob Korn

More parking restrictions could be coming to 16th Street NW as part of the ongoing changes to prepare the corridor for rush-hour transit lanes, expected by 2020.

The D.C. Department of Transportation says it is moving to lengthen 22 bus zones along 16th Street to better accommodate articulated buses. In the process, it would remove up to 66 parking spaces.

City planners are studying additional impacts on parking that could result from adding dedicated transit lanes to one of the city’s busiest commuter corridors. Parking now allowed in the off-peak direction during rush hour could be removed to allow for travel in all traffic lanes during the morning and evening commutes.

DDOT also is evaluating a proposal to extend rush-hour parking restrictions along the corridor to ease bus travel. Next week, however, the agency plans to bring back regular rush hours to this and other corridors where the agency extended parking restrictions by 30 minutes to ease congestion during SafeTrack. Metro’s yearlong maintenance program ends Sunday, and parking prohibitions will return to normal: 7 to 9:30 a.m. and 4 to 6:30 p.m.

The ongoing changes could reduce parking availability on 16th Street, but transit advocates say they are necessary to prioritize bus use in the corridor that carries as many as 20,000 commuters on a typical weekday. Some say it is a luxury to have any parking available on one of the city’s busiest thoroughfares.

The bus lane plan has been embraced by bus riders and city residents, who say dedicated lanes could help solve chronic problems on the S-Line, including crowding, bunching and delays.

The improvements would benefit thousands of riders who are often stuck behind traffic traveling at speeds of less than 10 miles per hour. The S-Line transports more people than cars during rush hour, making the corridor an ideal testing ground for the type of improved bus service that transit advocates and riders say would make Metrobus more efficient and attractive to commuters.

“People love their 16th street bus service and they love riding,” said Cheryl Cort, an advocate for bus lanes with the Coalition for Smarter Growth. Without bus lanes, she said, the problems will continue or worsen. Sometimes, buses are so crowded, she said, that four buses pass her before she can board one.

Metro has invested in the line, adding trips and restructuring service to provide extra buses along the southern portion. But as service was added, ridership grew.

DDOT began design work on the lanes last year, along with other enhancements to the road infrastructure, such as adjusting the timing of traffic lights and more frequent buses. Parking restrictions are next in the process, which also calls for the elimination of bus stops and more upgrades to the bus fleet. Plans also call for an off-board payment system and all-door entry on S-Line buses to reduce dwelling times at bus stops.

The bus lanes would run peak-direction during rush hour, from Arkansas Avenue in the upper Northwest area to H Street in downtown.

Earlier plans to extend the center reversible lane from Arkansas Avenue to K Street by installing a fifth lane south of U Street may not be possible because parts of the corridor are 2 to 3 feet short of the 50 feet needed to have five, 10-foot traffic lanes, officials say.

Still, the city said it is moving forward with rush-hour transit lanes throughout the length of the corridor. DDOT will present alternatives for how to do that in the segment that has only four lanes at a meeting next month.

As the project advances, the most controversial part has been the potential elimination of eight bus stops: southbound stops at Newton, Lamont and V streets; and northbound at L, Q, V, Lamont and Newton streets.

Residents and community leaders said at a meeting last week that taking away stops would impact riders, many of them elderly and with young children, who already walk four or five blocks to get to their bus stops.

Kishan Putta, a community activist who has been pushing for the transit lane for the past four years, said the consolidation of bus stops could alienate riders and the time savings is not worth it. Instead, he said, DDOT should consider whether it makes sense to have some buses uses different stops.

As part of the ongoing changes in the corridor, Metro will add more rush-hour trips on the S9 buses starting Sunday. In recent months, the limited-stop route tested transit signal priority, a system that allows the bus extra green time at the light so it can stay on schedule.

City officials say they are still evaluating the program’s success, and whether significant time savings are accomplished, before implementing on the S1, S2 and S4.

With regards to parking, DDOT spokesman Terry Owens said the city plans to begin work with Advisory Neighborhood Commissions on the parking spaces that will be removed to make bus zones longer. He said the minimum length of a bus zone on an articulated bus route is 110 feet. Twenty-two bus zones don’t meet that guideline and will be lengthened by 40 to 60 feet, which means two to three parking spaces at some locations.

DDOT’s project timeline puts bus lane in the corridor by 2020. Under DDOT’s proposal, buses would have a southbound dedicated lane from 7 to 10 a.m. and a northbound one from 4 to 7:30 p.m.

The lane could save nearly six minutes of travel time during the morning commute for some southbound buses and the same for the northbound traffic in the evening, but general traffic would see modest increases in travel time, according to a DDOT study.

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Guest comment: 20 years in, still lots of smart growth work to do

Posted on by Jacob Korn

The Coalition for Smarter Growth celebrated its 20th anniversary last week at an event that captured the diverse coalition helping to shape a more sustainable path for regional growth. Founded in 1997 by the D.C. region’s leading regional conservation groups, CSG today partners with housing, transit, and bicycle/pedestrian groups, neighborhood activists, the development, architecture, and planning sectors, and local governments to promote mixed-use, mixed-income, transit-oriented development.

We’ve supported millions of square feet of development and tens of thousands of housing units in smart growth locations. We’ve also pressed for the policies necessary for these projects to be sustainable and inclusive, including good design, reduced parking, affordable housing, “complete streets” designed to be safe for all users and modern stormwater management. The market has responded:

  • 86 percent of new office development is within ¼ mile of Metro;
  • Marriott, Nestle, Hilton, Choice Hotels, and many other corporations are moving to Metro station locations;
  • The JBG Cos. and Vornado Realty Trust are merging and concentrating their entire portfolio at Metro; and
  • D.C. has added 120,000 new residents over the past 12 years.

Fairfax County Board Chairman Sharon Bulova has said “transit-oriented development is Fairfax’ future.” So have leaders of most other jurisdictions, who have incorporated transit-oriented development as the core of the Council of Government’s Region Forward vision plan.

We’ve learned a lot along the path:

  • The demand for convenient urban living has helped revitalize neighborhoods but also created major affordability challenges. We need more housing closer to jobs, bigger housing trust funds, inclusionary policies, and more rapid planning and zoning changes – especially for commercial strip corridors.
  • Neighborhoods are concerned about rapid change and the addition of medium- to higher-density development. We need everyone at the table in planning for the future, excellent architecture, community benefits including town greens and pocket parks, and parking reform and demand management to ensure walking, biking, and transit are the predominant travel modes.
  • Partnerships are critically important. We would not have made this much progress without working with other nonprofits, smart growth developers, progressive architects and land use and transportation planners.
  • Transportation planning changes far too slowly and too few recognize the limitations of highway expansion – that new highways and additional lanes induce travel pattern changes and more auto-dependent development which fill up the new lanes in as little as five years.
  • Pricing matters – low gas prices and free or reduced-price parking encourage longer commutes and more driving while adding to congestion, while higher gas prices, market-priced parking, and affordable, frequent transit encourage transit use and living in walkable, transit-oriented neighborhoods.
  • Leadership by elected officials, local planners and the private sector is essential. That’s why our annual award event recognizes the critical role of our democratically elected leaders, the technical skills of local planners, and the commitment to well-designed projects by the private sector.

Our region faces challenges, which we intend to help tackle in the same spirit of partnership that got us here. These include Metro’s aging infrastructure and a transit funding crisis, ongoing neighborhood concerns about medium and higher density development near transit, housing affordability, and the urgent need to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions that fuel climate change.

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Purple Line supporters say judge’s ruling presents an opportunity to end legal delays

Posted on by Jacob Korn

Purple Line supporters Monday described a federal judge’s latest ruling in the long-running Purple Line lawsuit as “ludicrous” and “terribly flawed,” while the plaintiffs called it a “victory for everybody.”

Both sides were quick to react after Judge Richard Leon issued a ruling Monday morning that called for the Federal Transit Administration to conduct a new environmental review that thoroughly considers the possible impact of Metro’s ongoing ridership decline and safety issues on the planned 16.2-mile light-rail project.

The long-awaited ruling came in a lawsuit filed in 2014 by two Town of Chevy Chase residents—John Fitzgerald and Christine Real de Azua—and the trail advocacy group Friends of the Capital Crescent Trail.

Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan called the ruling “incredibly disappointing, but not entirely surprising,” and said the state “will continue to pursue any and all legal action to ensure that the Purple Line will move forward.”

Leon took about five months to issue the ruling after receiving information from FTA and Maryland Transit Administrations that stated Metro’s woes wouldn’t significantly impact ridership on the Purple Line. It could take several months or more than a year to conduct the new environmental analysis ordered by the judge, which requires public hearings, if the state accepts the ruling and doesn’t appeal it.

“The fact that it took a federal judge this long to reach the conclusion that more study is needed is completely baffling and, if allowed to stand, will cause irreparable harm to this vital project and cost the state hundreds of millions in taxpayer dollars,” Hogan said in a statement issued Monday afternoon. He said the ruling ignores the opinions of federal and state transportation experts as well as environmental advocates who support the project.

“This is not a political issue—it’s an important transportation and transit priority for Maryland and the region that has strong bipartisan support,” Hogan said.

Opponents of the project were pleased with the ruling.

“Obviously, it’s a victory of substantive analysis over agency arrogance,” Ajay Bhatt, president of Friends of the Capital Crescent Trail, said Monday. “Before Montgomery County, Prince George’s County and the state continue to push this fiscally irresponsible and environmentally damaging project, we should focus on Metro’s woes.”

He said the state and the two counties that are contributing funding to the project should shift that money to help the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority fix Metro and to other projects that could reduce traffic congestion in the area.

“This really is a victory for everybody,” Bhatt said.

Fitzgerald, who also serves as an attorney on the case, said in a statement the judge’s order requiring the FTA to conduct a new Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement “should provide the public with a chance to put up-to-date facts on the record.”

Leon’s decision is likely to further delay the start of construction, which was scheduled to begin late last year. A spokeswoman for the Maryland Attorney General’s Office said officials are reviewing Leon’s order before determining whether they’ll take additional legal steps. Earlier this month, Attorney General Brian Frosh requested a legal maneuver in D.C.’s federal Court of Appeals to try to force Leon to issue a ruling by June 1.

State officials have warned in court filings that further delay could result in losses of $13 million per month and possibly lead to the cancellation of the project. Leon previously vacated the project’s federal approval in an August ruling, preventing the state from securing $900 million in federal funding needed to pay for construction, which is expected to cost more than $2 billion.

The entire project is estimated to cost $5.6 billion over the 36-year contract with the state’s private partner—Purple Line Transit Partners—which is a group of finance and construction companies working with the state to design, build, operate and maintain the light-rail line.

The state has also estimated that it stands to lose about $800 million that’s already been spent on planning and designing the project as well as for contractual penalties that must be paid to the private partner if the project is cancelled.

In his ruling, Leon said the federal and Maryland transit administrations failed to adequately analyze the potential impact of Metro’s ridership decline on the future ridership of the Purple Line.

However, the transit agencies found that even if no Metro riders used the Purple Line, the light-rail line would still have about 50,000 weekday riders by 2040, compared to the 69,300 including Metro riders that is currently projected. Ridership at that level would still be enough to meet the line’s purpose—to create a reliable east-west transit system between Montgomery and Prince George’s counties, according to the agencies.

Metro’s ridership problems are among about two dozen environmental issues that the plaintiffs claimed the agencies failed to account for in their 2014 environmental review of the project.

Leon said he’ll “issue an opinion on these remaining issues in the next few weeks”—raising the possibility that additional roadblocks besides Metro’s issues could be raised. It’s not immediately clear if the state can appeal Monday’s ruling given that Leon hasn’t ruled on the other pending issues in the case.

Meanwhile, Purple Line supporters believe Leon’s decision provides the state with an opportunity to appeal his order.

Montgomery County Council President Roger Berliner called the ruling “a terribly flawed decision, one that I am confident will be reversed by the Court of Appeals—and the sooner the better.”

Berliner added that Leon’s opinion is “profoundly lacking in logic” because it says Metro’s current travails will have a profound impact on ridership on the Purple Line in the year 2040, when FTA provided evidence that shows if there was not a single rider from Metro, and in effect no Metro system at all, that the Purple Line would still be in the public interest.

The Purple Line would be operated by the state’s private partnerer, not WMATA, but the line is designed to connect with Metrorail at five stations where riders are expected to transfer between the two transit systems.

County Council member Hans Riemer, an ardent Purple Line supporter, said he was not surprised by Leon’s decision.

“I think it’s good that we got this decision now, rather than six months from now,” Riemer said. “I think the judge probably would have sat on it as long as he possibly could.”

The judge wrote in his order that the decision took a considerable amount of time because he had a large caseload. He noted that since late January he has issued more than 22 written opinions and presided over 60 hearings in other cases.

“[Leon] is so wrong that in my opinion it proves that he’s biased,” Riemer said. “The state has already responded that a reduction in Metro ridership is irrelevant to the core decision of whether this is a cost-effective project. Even if Metro doesn’t exist, there’s still enough Purple Line riders to make it a good federal, state and local investment.”

However, Bhatt said state officials should be held accountable for signing the contract with the private partner while the federal lawsuit was still pending.

“Who’s going to be held accountable for the state’s decision to sign the $5.6 billion contract while the federal lawsuit hadn’t yet had its day in court?” Bhatt asked.

Pro-transit groups on Monday universally panned the judge’s decision.

“The slapdash and tardy ruling outright ignores much of the expert testimony that has already answered questions raised again by the court,” Ralph Bennett, president of Purple Line NOW, said in a statement. “Still, we are relieved to finally have a ruling, as Judge Leon has given ample grounds for appeal and we trust that the fundamental strength of the project will be vindicated in higher court.”

The Coalition for Smarter Growth, which supports transit-oriented development projects in the D.C. region, maintained the Purple Line will spur economic development along its east-west route between Bethesda and New Carrollton in Prince George’s counties.

“The Purple Line is a badly-needed east-west transit connection for access to jobs and revitalization, and significant ridership will be driven by that demand, as well as the revitalization inside the Beltway that the project will spur,” Executive Director Stewart Schwartz said in a statement.

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