The Triangle’s two metropolitan planning organizations have joined forces to bring an ambitious mass-transit system to the region that could cost $2 billion, but taxpayers won’t get much time to digest the proposal.
The commission’s charge calls for a “robust public outreach/community engagement effort,” but a draft copy of the recommendations will be available for public feedback just one week prior to the commission’s final vote Feb. 29.
“There won’t be enough time for us to take the public input and incorporate it,” said George Cianciolo, a commission cochairman and pathology professor at Duke University Medical Center, “so we’ll let the public look at the report, make comments either by email or letter, and all of that information will be sent on to the MPOs.”
A Special Transit Advisory Commission proposed the new transit plan, the full details of which have yet to be hashed out. But taxpayers would contribute $2 billion for the system via a half-cent sales tax increase, an annual $10 vehicle registration fee, and state and federal dollars to supplement the overall cost. The plan also calls for $600 million in other taxpayer financing.
In addition to other initiatives, the plan would beef up bus services and create 56 miles of rail lines by 2020 connecting cities throughout the Triangle.
But one transit expert says this plan goes farther down the wrong road than a previous rail-transit plan that failed due to lack of federal commitment.
“They’ve proposed an even more glorious mess,” said David Hartgen, retired professor of transportation studies at UNC-Charlotte. “This proposal is a significant threat to the region because it reintroduces the idea that you can have something for nothing.”
New plan
Plans for a light rail transit line in the Raleigh region had fallen through in 2006 after the Triangle Transit Authority failed to secure the necessary federal funds. The new effort, spearheaded by the Durham-Chapel Hill-Carrboro and N.C. Capital Area metropolitan planning organizations (MPO), goes well beyond the TTA’s original vision.
The Special Transit Advisory Commission, created by the two MPOs in early 2007, approved some preliminary components of the plan during a meeting Feb. 4. The commission is to assist the MPOs in creating a plan for regional transit. Commission members are expected to approve final recommendations for the transit project by Feb. 29.
According to a commission statement, the recommendations will “serve as the foundation for making comprehensive, cooperative, and well-coordinated decisions on future major transit investments.”
The 29-member commission began meeting in early May. Several of the commission members are former elected officials, including former Raleigh mayors Smedes York and Tom Bradshaw. Others are associated with environmental groups, such as the Sierra Club and the Eno River Association. Raleigh Mayor Charles Meeker is an ex-officio member, as is Mack McKrell, a Cary resident who is described only as a “long-time regional transit user.”
Transit benefits?
The proposed transit system would reduce congestion, improve air quality, attract business, and give residents more transportation choices, said Cianciolo, a commission cochairman.
“One of the things we have going for us is that obviously transit has worked very well in Charlotte, where the rider numbers have been well beyond their initial expectations,” he said. “People are ready for transit for a lot of reasons, but there has been an economic stimulus driven by the high cost of gasoline.”
Others have a less-favorable view of a wide-scale rail transit system. “I don’t see anything in the current proposal that suggests the problems the previous TTA proposal had — problems like high cost, limited ridership, no effect on air pollution — will be solved,” Hartgen said.
While Cianciolo argued that rail transit would reduce traffic on the roadways, Hartgen said he has never seen a transit line that reduced congestion. “For those who do divert from cars to public transit, the road system is filled by others taking their place,” he said.
A rail transit system would also give commuters back some of their time, Cianciolo said, by freeing them up to pursue other activities while traveling.
“One of the things people have to understand with trains is that it may not get you there faster, but it gives you back your time,” he said. “You can actually be doing something, such as using a laptop or phone.”
Hartgen called that perspective “a white yuppie view of the world” that fails to take into account the time necessary to get to and from the rail system.
Funding considerations
Members of the commission are hoping that the federal government will finance 25 percent to 50 percent of the project and that the state government another 25 percent.
“Realistically, even 25 percent might look difficult,” Cianciolo said about the federal funding, “but with this plan being a truly regional plan, the people in finance on the commission thought 25 percent was realistic.”
Minutes of the commission’s meeting Feb. 4 indicate that commission members, at least in part, are proposing such a large plan to show officials who control government purse strings how serious the region is about transit. “This regional plan is ambitious, but will show the federal government that we are committed to building a regional system,” the minutes say.
In light of the failed TTA rail project, Cianciolo said he thinks planning as a region is important for generating public and financial support. “That’s the point we’re going to make to the MPOs — you’ve got to think big enough that it has a chance to succeed,” he said.
Hartgen estimated that final costs would be double what the commission projected. He said commission members are hoping for a change in the administration in Washington, D.C., to “wiggle the money from similarly inclined officials.”
“We would all like something for Christmas that we cannot afford,” Hartgen said. “Most of us learned that lesson, but Raleigh and Durham haven’t. They’re going to their government parents and asking.”
David N. Bass is an associate editor of Carolina Journal.