Did Honolulu City Council Get the Memo from U.S. Congress?

Minutes ago I sent this message to our City Council:

Dear Council Members,

On Tuesday House Transportation Committee Chairman John Mica, R-Fla. said this: “Rather than focusing on the Northeast Corridor, the most congested corridor in the nation and the only corridor owned by the federal government, the Administration continues to squander limited taxpayer dollars on marginal projects.”
Source: http://transportation.house.gov/news/PRArticle.aspx?NewsID=1065

By this statement it is clear that:

(1) Mica urges focus on the Northeast Corridor and he does not seem interested in preserving funds for the Florida ("his own") rail project.

(2) If it comes to a choice for Mica between SunRail and Honolulu's rail, he would most likely opt to save SunRail. It does not matter that SunRail is an FRA project and Honolulu Rail is an FTA project. It's all coming from the federal budget, specifically, the Highway Trust Fund. (Indeed, more rail projects does mean more potholes and falling bridges.)

(3) Mica knows that projects are rated good, marginal or poor. He's not interested in marginal and poor projects. Honolulu's overall FTA rating is medium (marginal) and our financial plan is defective and the population projections used to derive ridership are wrong.

At a minimum, the Honolulu City Council must not approve any expenditures on rail construction until the FFGA is concluded and the contribution is the promised $1.85 Billion.

After that point, the responsibility of adding $4 Billion debt onto Oahu taxpayers will be all yours.

Aloha,
Panos

Who Opposes Honolulu Elevated Rail?

Pearl Johnson lists some of the groups opposing the elevated rail proposal in the letter to the editor of the Honolulu Star Advertiser copied below. Quite a few!

Additional groups include the HonoluluTraffic.com group, the Fix Now Campaign of yours truly and many architects, engineers and planners. Let's not forget that Bishop Estate favors light rail. Also Federal Judges oppose the rail route using Halekawila Street.

The Sierra Club and Blue Planet Foundations have not had time yet to assess the colossal environmental and pollution impact of this boondoggle, but they are welcome to join when they peel off rail's pseudogreen labels and discover all the soot.

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Groups oppose elevated rail

Recent media portrayal of the growing opposition to the city's rail transit plan was unfortunately reduced to a political dust-up between former Gov. Ben Cayetano and Mayor Peter Carlisle. It obscured our shared belief that the city's proposed elevated heavy rail project will destroy mauka-makai view planes, create a physical barrier between the city and our famed waterfront and disturb native Hawaiian burial grounds along its right-of-way.

We consequently are united in opposing the construction of an elevated heavy-rail system through historic downtown Honolulu and strongly urge consideration of a less destructive and more neighborhood-friendly system.

"We" includes the League of Women Voters of Honolulu, The Outdoor Circle, Hawaii's Thousand Friends, Life of the Land, Residents Along The Rail, Save Oahu Farmland Alliance, Friends of Makakilo, Hoa'aina o Hawai'i'imiloa of Leeward Community College and Donors of Irwin Park.

Everyone must learn about the realities of the city's plan and the steamroller process that is propelling it. There's much more to come.

Pearl Johnson
League of Women Voters of Honolulu

Where is The Money for The Rail

Where is the Money? is one question everyone should be asking of the Carlisle Administration.

The other is: How dare you start construction with no guarantee of the federal monies?

Today Minneapolis/Saint Paul concluded their funding agreement with the FTA for Light Rail. See article below.

Notes relevant to Honolulu:

• Twin Cities did not start before they got their money.
• Their cost is under one billion. Ours is close to six billion for one third the population!
• They got a 50% match like we got in 1990. Now our match is about 30%.
• Over the last few days I contacted experts who said that rarely if ever a city starts construction before the Full Funding Grant Agreement is concluded.
• Except for Honolulu. Mayor Harris and Transit Planner Hamayasu (also in charge of the rail project now) jumped the gun with the BRT. In a case of national embarrassment, the FTA withdrew Honolulu's Record on Decision. (History has a way of repeating itself...)
  

Hot off the press: Twin Cities’ light rail project clears money hurdle

Minneapolis — The Metropolitan Council and other local agencies finally have the news they have been seeking: The Federal Transit Administration has sent to Congress the grant agreement for the Central Corridor light rail project.

The move launches a 60-day review various officials described as a courtesy, meaning Congress is expected to approve the grant agreement in early April.

That will let the FTA and the Met Council sign the agreement contract that guarantees the federal government will pay for half of the $957 million light rail project. Officials in Washington, D.C., had delayed delivery of the grant agreement several times, but it was not clear why.

The Central Corridor, the biggest public works project in Minnesota history, will connect the downtowns of St. Paul and Minneapolis via an 11-mile route when it opens in 2014.

Rail Will Cost About $3 Billion

I would like to preserve this gem from August 19, 2006 for historical purposes because The Honolulu Advertiser is history and its server may disappear. Please read it and then take a look at my four 2011 updates at the end.

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MAYOR WILL INSIST CITY LIVE WITHIN ITS MEANS

As the City and County of Honolulu proceeds with its analysis of O'ahu's transportation future and holds community meetings to solicit public input, the cost of a proposed fixed guideway is a common topic of discussion.

As is their role, the professional planners and engineers involved in this Honolulu High-Capacity Transit Corridor Project are gathering data, making analyses and evaluations, and preparing recommendations for the City Council, which will make the final selection of a transit alternative later this year. The planners and engineers are envisioning a system where money is not a primary factor, a transit network that accommodates all needs well into the future, a world-class fixed guideway that rivals those of the great cities around the world.

That is not the world in which we live. It is my responsibility to balance needs with resources. This has meant that we've had to make some tough fiscal decisions over the past year-and-a-half, foregoing the nice-to-have for the need-to-have.

The transit system the city ultimately will support will meet our immediate needs and our budget, estimated at around $3 billion. This is called a "minimal operable system" in the parlance of transportation engineering. Yes, a multifaceted, multimodal approach to solving our growing traffic mess falls within the need-to-have, but I want to be careful that we do not exceed our financial limits.

If revenues from the general excise tax surcharge provide more money [1] for our transportation coffers, or if private partnerships [2] generate a major infusion of cash, or if we receive any financial windfalls [3] for mass transit, then we can consider spending more money to expand the system.

Until then, I will continue to insist that we live within our means.[4]

Mufi Hannemann
Mayor

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I inserted four notes in the concluding part to provide 2011 updates:

[1] The surcharge provided over $100 million LESS than expected between 2007 and 2011 and as a result TheBus budget was raided to sore up the "budget."

[2] Hannemann knew he was kidding with this one. No private monies are available for rail transit. Rail projects are money pits. On the contrary, developers are expecting tax breaks (which means taxpayer monies) to develop around stations.

[3] Here the expectations went to the wild side. Windfalls were expected while the 2011 Congress is all about cuts.

[4] The current version of living within our means (as Hannemann put it), or getting our house in order (as Carlisle put it) is furloughing the City's own employees, operating under an EPA mandate that is expected to cost well over $4 Billion, and at the same time pursuing a train that has doubled in cost!

By the way, the Minimum Operating Segment that the letter refers to is now what we present as the planned 20-mile system from Kapolei to Ala Moana Center, the first six miles of which is the train to nowhere starting over half a mile outside Kapolei and ending in Pearl Highlands, going through Oahu's last prime agricultural lands. This video produced by the City shows the destruction of agriculture and the prevailing low densities that are inappropriate for elevated heavy rail. The picture below shows the destruction of Waipahu.