Re: RDU light rail program likely dead


*** Boyd wrote:
> Larry Gross wrote:
> > John Lansford wrote:
> > > "Larry Gross" <gross.larry@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> > <snip>
> Is there a ranking and prioritization criteria for transportation
> projects?
>
> Yes, there are several criteria, depending on what type of money is
> being spent. If federal money is involved, there are Federal Register
> and Commerce Business Daily processes. Trust your state officials to
> answer these. But I can't really say that is the best advice, because
> most recipient states (those that get more federal funds than are
> collected from fuel taxes in their borders) have cracked the code on
> how to get local cooperation to pass a unified plan for the state.
> Massachusetts opposed to California or Virgnia for instance.
>
..
..
> Even with federal money, there are different cases. Set asides for rail
> road crossings, historic roads, etc. Controlling factor is that local
> money is required. Sometimes the local money is required up front. The
> feds make progress payments or reimburse when the project is finished.
> Some places look on this a "found money". Four dollars back for every
> dollar local. Some places use the match to veto projects. Early Shirley
> Highway for instance.
>
> But here's the rub. Politicians muddy the water by providing press
> releases that the public construes to be the gospel and will be built
> next week. Politicians instist on keeping carrots in the plans that
> will never get built, but will garner votes, as John pointed out.
>
> John mentioned that he had never heard of a project that was abandoned.
> Maybe I misunderstood his statement, but any interstate through a city
> has some abandoned character. The most obvious being I-95 through DC.
>

sometimes methinks the guys in the DOTs are so embedded in the forest
that when you ask them to explain a tree... the explanation ends up
sounding
like gobblygook to the non-DOT person... :-)

There are LOTS of funding streams each with it's own flow schedule as
well
as what it can and can't be spent for... keeps folks in jobs forever..

but that is not really important to the average person - all they are
trying to
understand if what roads are on the "list", what criteria is used to
rank
them - AND - when will they be built.

The MPO approach (to me) makes perfect sense - you have a 6yr window
(TIP) and a 20 year window (CLRP).

Both plans are supposed to be (by law) financially-constrained - in
layman's
terms - you can't have more projects on either list than there is
identified
funding for. Again - this makes perfect sense and is understandable by
the
average person. They don't need to know the ugly funding stream mess
underneath - only what exists on the "lists".

One of the reasons that politics get involved is because local
officials don't
understand the process... either ... and so they just cut to the chase
and
say "I want THIS road" done -

But I go back to the original thought. HOW do projects get on the 6yr
"stack"? How do they move from the CLRP stack to the TIP "stack".

What is the criteria for moviing them? Is it based on the number of
accidents?
How about congestion relief?

I know and understand that it is more complex in fact but it appears to
me
that almost no attempt is made to explain this - and remember - the
funding
comes from taxpayers and users who ARE interested in the when/where/how
and yet they end up being treated like they're trying to intrude into
things
that are not their affairs.

I have one more complaint. and that is that the TIP and CLRP are
supposed
to be financially constrained - and what this means in terms of
expectations
to the average person is that if a project is in the 6yr Plan - that it
WILL be
built in that window - and that's not what happens because first the
projects
are often "low-balled" but worse than that - the TIPs do not appear to
be
adjusted for inflation and increased prices in materials.

If they were - it would become very important which projects had a
higher
priority - because the cost associated with them would rise .. the
longer
it would take to build them.

Overall the TIP should show inflation-adjusted costs each year - that
would
actually result in one or more projects being removed as costs went up
.... OR the total costs for the TIP would be depicted in today's
dollars
PLUS 6yr inflation.

In other words, each project cost would be shown
in terms of what it will cost in 6yrs - NOT what they would cost in
year 1 - when we know they won't be built in year one.

To put this in succinct words - the TIPs and CLRPs do not reflect
realities while the public perceives them to depict projects that WILL
be built in those timeframes. Instead, projects shown in the 6yr
windows do not get built in that 6yr window - and from the customer
point of view - 6yr window is fantasy - not to be believed.

That destroys the whole intent of the 6 yr window - from a customer
point of view. They learn quickly that the whole process is not as
depicted and not to be trusted as a realistic projection of what,
in fact, will happen.

The DOT folks KNOW how it really works - and they are the only
ones and the fact that customers don't know ... is apparently
no one's responsibility so when public hearings are held for
"comment" from the public - it's a joke. How can people
make intelligent comments - useful input - to a process that
works like this?

.