HOT lanes reversal reflects lack of vision, leadership for transportation in Georgia
If there’s one thing I’m sick of hearing, it’s that metro Atlanta and Georgia have no “plan B” for transportation. That’s because, increasingly, there’s no “plan A,” either.
The latest example is the Department of Transportation’s decision this past week to abort the optional toll lanes on I-75 and I-575 in Cobb and Cherokee.
Some 200,000 commuters travel that corridor daily. The stretch of 75 between the 575 split and the top-end perimeter is one of the most congested highways in metro Atlanta. Yet, here’s what those commuters will have to show for years of DOT planning for toll lanes and the politicized exercise of drafting a project list for next year’s transportation tax referendum:
Jack. And squat.
A real plan for the corridor — and most of what I’m about to say also applies to other parts of the metro area — would:
a) Recognize there is neither the land nor the money available for building highway lanes ad infinitum, and that new general-purpose lanes quickly become as full as the older lanes;
b) Acknowledge the final piece of the Interstate portion of the corridor comprises high-occupancy toll (HOT) lanes that may or may not relieve congestion in older lanes, but which will guarantee someone who needs to travel rapidly at a given time can do so (for a price);
c) Devote more resources to nearby arterial roads to add parallel capacity for motorists, particularly those traveling relatively shorter distances;
d) Ensure any funds for mass transit are dedicated to uses such as commuter rail, which can provide high capacity at peak travel times without attempting to change lifestyles or prioritize developers’ dreams over commuters’ frustrations.
As of today, Cobb and Cherokee residents stand to get no additional general-purpose lanes, no HOT lanes, no enhanced arterials. Just some projects designed to encourage a certain kind of economic development — somewhere else. Oh, and, in about 10 years, a glorified streetcar that travels one mile outside Fulton.
It’s particularly galling that DOT has now spent eight years and tens of millions of dollars clearing its throat regarding public-private partnerships. Now it’s thrown all that away, without betraying the faintest clue as to what comes next.
The coup de grace came from DOT board member Brandon Beach, who told the AJC’s Ariel Hart that a turning point was the realization the state might have to pay up to 45 percent of the project’s $1 billion cost.
“There gets a point where if you’re going to do that much public participation, you may want to look at doing the project yourself,” Beach said, right before admitting DOT doesn’t have that kind of money.
Let’s get this straight: $450 million is too much money, so it’s better to spend $1 billion? A billion dollars we don’t have? So that we can recoup money from tolls instead of … not spending it in the first place?
For, if the private firms felt they couldn’t recoup more than $550 million in costs from tolls, why should we believe the state would recoup more? As it stands, fat chance of enticing them or other firms to invest in our infrastructure in the future.
We often hear politicians and experts say voters must approve the T-SPLOST so that metro Atlanta isn’t seen as backward and indecisive. After these follies, on the heels of the broken promise to remove the Ga. 400 toll last summer, maybe voters need to reject it — to get the attention of those politicians and experts. Their decisiveness and vision leave a lot to be desired, too.
– By Kyle Wingfield
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320 comments Add your comment
Will the last Democrat in Georgia please turn off the lights?.....
December 20th, 2011
3:12 pm
BILLY MAYS HERE
December 20th, 2011
3:01 pm
“Officials been talking about the gulch for 15 years now, and the reason real estate speculators are snapping up land is because it’s relatively inexpensive and rapidly being gentrified, not because of a terminal that may or may not be built in a decade or two.”
The speculators are not just snapping up land there JUST because of gentification, but because all of the real estate insiders and major players know that Atlanta’s future is as a rail town, not the car-crazed city that everyone has always known for the last 50 years.
There’s no more money in automobile-anchored sprawl, the money will be in rail-based development in the 21st Century, a fact that they know in Dallas, in Charlotte and here in Atlanta.
Will the last Democrat in Georgia please turn off the lights?.....
December 20th, 2011
3:18 pm
There’s no way that BART could provide headways as low as four minutes during peak hours with only a flat $2.50 fare like MARTA, even with extensive public subsidies.
Will the last Democrat in Georgia please turn off the lights?.....
December 20th, 2011
3:22 pm
BILLY MAYS HERE
December 20th, 2011
3:11 pm
“In 2005, only 53% of BART’s revenue was paid by fares, the rest was from public sources or advertising. And that’s considered good for public transit.”
Besides taxes, those “public sources” include fees on traffic tickets and parking tickets and user fees on parking rates as opposed to just a mere 1% sales tax here in Atlanta.
BILLY MAYS HERE
December 20th, 2011
3:30 pm
Will the last Democrat in Georgia please turn off the lights?…..
December 20th, 2011
3:12 pm
The speculators are not just snapping up land there JUST because of gentification, but because all of the real estate insiders and major players know that Atlanta’s future is as a rail town, not the car-crazed city that everyone has always known for the last 50 years.
That’s pretty objective, even for an opinion
Will the last Democrat in Georgia please turn off the lights?.....
December 20th, 2011
3:31 pm
“So, if on a good day BART’s fares (user fees) pay just over half of the bills, it can be said that user fees alone won’t keep the system running, much less expand it. They’re haven’t in the past on any public transportation system, and won’t in the future. Why do you keep saying they will?”
Ahhh, but that’s the thing, user fees don’t just include higher fares alone, but they also include revenue streams from traffic fines and tickets, parking fines and tickets, fees on parking rates, etc, just call it “creative financing”.
Heck, you could get really creative and levy “fees” on adult toys and novelties, alcoholic beverages, fees that most might call “sin taxes”.
Just don’t call any of those ‘fees’ a “tax” under no circumstances, especially when in the company of conservative and libertarian company as the word “fee” is much more politically palatable than the word “tax” on the political right. (Hey, we’ve got to raise this money some way, you know?)
BILLY MAYS HERE
December 20th, 2011
3:31 pm
Will the last Democrat in Georgia please turn off the lights?…..
December 20th, 2011
3:18 pm
There’s no way that BART could provide headways as low as four minutes during peak hours with only a flat $2.50 fare like MARTA, even with extensive public subsidies.
Irrelevant point… your precious, precious user fees don’t come close to keeping the system running as you stated all along
BILLY MAYS HERE
December 20th, 2011
3:32 pm
Will the last Democrat in Georgia please turn off the lights?…..
December 20th, 2011
3:31 pm
“So, if on a good day BART’s fares (user fees) pay just over half of the bills, it can be said that user fees alone won’t keep the system running, much less expand it. They’re haven’t in the past on any public transportation system, and won’t in the future. Why do you keep saying they will?”
Ahhh, but that’s the thing, user fees don’t just include higher fares alone, but they also include revenue streams from traffic fines and tickets, parking fines and tickets, fees on parking rates, etc, just call it “creative financing”.
Heck, you could get really creative and levy “fees” on adult toys and novelties, alcoholic beverages, fees that most might call “sin taxes”.
Just don’t call any of those ‘fees’ a “tax” under no circumstances, especially when in the company of conservative and libertarian company as the word “fee” is much more politically palatable than the word “tax” on the political right. (Hey, we’ve got to raise this money some way, you know?)
You’re trying too hard, jut give it up dude
Will the last Democrat in Georgia please turn off the lights?.....
December 20th, 2011
3:39 pm
BILLY MAYS HERE
December 20th, 2011
3:30 pm
I might have stated it before, but one of the same high-ranking state legislators who is bat-sh** crazy over extending HOT lanes to every major roadway in Metro Atlanta is also one of the state’s biggest advocates of high-speed rail.
State Senator Jeff Mullis, who has been going around referring to the I-85 (and I-75) HOT lanes as “his baby” is also a very loud advocate for high-speed and commuter rail on the CSX freight rail line that parallels I-75 between ATL and Chattanooga (a line that will go right by Mullis’ home in NW Georgia just outside Chattanooga) and on the NS/Amtrak line that parallels the stretch of I-85 with HOT lanes in Gwinnett.
HOT lanes are being used as the state’s bungling way to drive traffic off of the interstates and on to those future soon-to-be rail transit lines.
BILLY MAYS HERE
December 20th, 2011
3:44 pm
I’m not surprised, railroads have many politicians in their pocket and they’d love to have expanded rights-of-way at no cost while still maintaining complete control over them.
He’s just another moron shill in Georgia politics.
Will the last Democrat in Georgia please turn off the lights?.....
December 20th, 2011
3:51 pm
“Ahhh, but that’s the thing, user fees don’t just include higher fares alone, but they also include revenue streams from traffic fines and tickets, parking fines and tickets, fees on parking rates, etc, just call it “creative financing””
Keep-in-mind that the fees on the parking rates, parking fines and traffic fines in the Bay Area are officially defined as “public sources”, not user fees, but I regard them as user fees.
BILLY MAYS HERE
December 20th, 2011
4:04 pm
Wikipedia’s one step ahead of you, 32% of BART’s revenue was from taxes, 15% from other sources (such as parking fees, ads, and leasing), the remainder was from fares (2005 figures) Again, user fees alone never have and will never fully fund a transit system, you will always need considerable tax revenue to fund public transit.
Will the last Democrat in Georgia please turn off the lights?.....
December 20th, 2011
5:27 pm
BILLY MAYS HERE
December 20th, 2011
4:04 pm
Well, I sure as hell don’t disagree that you need taxes to fund public transit, but, ESPECIALLY, in this political environment when extra tax revenue isn’t available you’ve got to increase and expand the service some way.
With the extra tax revenue not coming anytime soon, the best way to add service where needed at this point would be for the state to float bonds to pay for expansion up front (as mass transit is one of the best infrastructural investments that can be made as many of those who are traditionally transit-averse are in the process of finding out) and then pay off those bonds with higher fares over time (probably a period of 20-40 years).
Will the last Democrat in Georgia please turn off the lights?.....
December 20th, 2011
5:34 pm
Personally, I would be willing to pay moderately higher taxes (not too high) to help fund what at this point have become very critically-needed rail and road improvements and I would also be willing to pay substantially higher fares (to the tune of the BART-like $10.90 one-way, if necessary) to get the level of service that this town needs much more quickly without having to wait 20 years or more.
At this point, the state has no severely neglected transportation that what ever we do is going to cost substantially more than if it had been done correctly all along, but that’s just the way that the cookie crumbles, I guess.
Unfortunately it looks like we may have to wonder around out in the transportation (and water) infrastructure wilderness for a few years before the lesson truly sinks in.
Will the last Democrat in Georgia please turn off the lights?.....
December 20th, 2011
6:20 pm
BILLY MAYS HERE
December 20th, 2011
2:11 pm
“Oh god, using existing freight rights-of-way sounds easy and cheap but it’s a bad, bad idea. You’ll always be at the mercy of the freight line, and essentially private railroads will get free infrastructure upgrades while still maintaining control of their lines.”
You’re right, using existing freight rail rights-of-way is not nearly as cheap and easy as it sounds as it’ll take well over $300 million alone to upgrade the CSX (Old Western & Atlantic) tracks that run parallel to the west of I-75 between Atlanta and Calhoun to accommodate high-frequency commuter rail.
But the $300 million or so is still relatively comparately cheaper than the $1.2 billion that the state wanted to spend on building HOT lanes on I-75 NW.
In the case of the NW metro CSX line, the state actually owns the right-of-way that the existing freight rail line runs on as shown here in a 2004 map sample:
http://www.dot.state.ga.us/maps/Documents/railroad/RAIL_MAP_SAMPLE.pdf
Owning that geographically-crucial CSX rail line gives the state a lot more leeway in saying how and when freight trains can run.
I know, it’s not the idea situation, but that CSX NW corridor runs directly through the historic, walkable and dense downtowns that are ideal to serve commuter and high-speed rail, much better than a park-and-ride located in a deserted and lifeless sprawled out post suburban mall parking lot.
“Operationally it’s a bad move because freight trains are more susceptible to delays en route (not to mention so much slower) than passenger trains.”
We’ll have to modify the tracks so that passenger trains and freight trains interrupt each other as little as is possible in those existing freight rail corridors which are targeted for commuter rail and eventually high-speed rail by the state.
Don
December 21st, 2011
10:35 am
BILLY MAYS HERE
December 20th, 2011
2:11 pm
VRE in Northern VA operates over CSX and NS lines. They had a 93% on time record in 2011.
It has been done elsewhere. It can be done here. It’s not really difficult. In fact, NS was ready, willing and able to do their part for the Lovejoy line. They were (and still are) just waiting on the state to get it’s act together.
There is one simple rule: “Don’t confiscated existing capacity”. What that typically means is the state will have to pay for some additional track (usually laying down a second track along side the existing one – in may places going down exactly where one was taken up in the 60s, 70s and 80s) and paying for some signalling. Not particularly expensive or hard to do.
Don
December 21st, 2011
10:41 am
BILLY MAYS HERE
December 20th, 2011
3:44 pm
The frt RRs are “agnostic” when it comes to commuter rail projects. They really don’t care either way if they get done or not. They only care that they are made whole at the end of the day. The planning and negotiating process are a bit of distraction, and the trains are a bit of a pain to dispatch around, but that is rather minor. The capacity improvements that are added don’t generally amount to much of a windfall, either.
Don
December 21st, 2011
10:44 am
The CSX line to Cobb is the toughest one in the region to add commuter rail to. It is already largely double track and has considerable freight traffic. The NS and CSX lines in Gwinnett would be much simpler to do. One is already largely double track and the other used to be. Both have only a moderate level of freight traffic. Biggest issue for them is capacity in the Atlanta terminal area.
BILLY MAYS HERE
December 22nd, 2011
1:04 am
Don
December 21st, 2011
10:41 am
BILLY MAYS HERE
December 20th, 2011
3:44 pm
The frt RRs are “agnostic” when it comes to commuter rail projects. They really don’t care either way if they get done or not. They only care that they are made whole at the end of the day. The planning and negotiating process are a bit of distraction, and the trains are a bit of a pain to dispatch around, but that is rather minor. The capacity improvements that are added don’t generally amount to much of a windfall, either.
I assume you’ve never worked in the railroad industry?
You can’t run freight and passenger at the same time. I mean, legally and operationally you can, but practically you cannot. Freights are slow and prone to mechanical troubles, that’s why some railroads have morning and afternoon windows wherein they rush passenger traffic down the line while holding freight back. Obviously, this slows down freight. When there’s not a window, you have to try to get fast commuter trains around slower freights. And if the freight train gets a knuckle, busts an air hose, or derails, everything melts down. And most railroad mainlines in the US already run near or at their capacity.
Freight carriers don’t like passenger trains–commuter or long-distance. They put up with it for the free infrastructure upgrades, but they’d prefer not to have it.
BILLY MAYS HERE
December 22nd, 2011
1:07 am
Don
December 21st, 2011
10:35 am
BILLY MAYS HERE
December 20th, 2011
2:11 pm
VRE in Northern VA operates over CSX and NS lines. They had a 93% on time record in 2011.
It has been done elsewhere. It can be done here. It’s not really difficult. In fact, NS was ready, willing and able to do their part for the Lovejoy line. They were (and still are) just waiting on the state to get it’s act together.
There is one simple rule: “Don’t confiscated existing capacity”. What that typically means is the state will have to pay for some additional track (usually laying down a second track along side the existing one – in may places going down exactly where one was taken up in the 60s, 70s and 80s) and paying for some signalling. Not particularly expensive or hard to do.
Adding additional mains with PTC signalling is easy and cheap?
Naw, dawg.
BILLY MAYS HERE
December 22nd, 2011
1:16 am
The only way a freight carrier will go with any commuter rail plan is a lot of political will, a lot of public money, and if its executives are convinced it will come out ahead in the end. The railroad industry has never welcomed change with open arms.