| Metro
Study Ignored Monorail |
|
To the editor:
|
| In 1999 the state of Virginia entered into an agreement
with the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (Metro)
whereby the latter agreed to prepare an Environmental Impact
Statement (EIS) to assess the impact of various methods by
which rapid transit could be achieved in the Dulles corridor.
|
| The study was to have evaluated the cost effectiveness of
heavy rail, light rail, metrorail, BRT and other means of
mass transportation. The cost of this study was to be around
$20 million. |
| At the time, it struck me as a little unusual for the state
to select one of the potential vendors of a rapid transit
system to provide the environmental analysis of the various
alternatives, including alternatives that vendor had not previously
been known to favor or build, such as light rail, monorail
or bus-rapid transit systems (BRT). |
| Three years later, my concerns of 1999 became more than
concerns when Metro produced a draft EIS. It is a document
which appears to have succeeded all too well in promoting
Metro¯s own favorite product, a heavy rail system, as the
preferred rapid transit alternative in the Dulles corridor.
The draft EIS completely ignored monorail, dismissing it as
an "emerging technology." |
| A BRT alternative was evaluated in the draft EIS, but the
assumptions employed as to the design of the system severely
compromised the evaluation and virtually guaranteed that heavy-rail
in the Dulles corridor would appear to be the more attractive
alternative. This flaw in Metro¯s draft EIS was very ably
demonstrated in the comments on the draft EIS filed by the
Breakthrough Technology Institute, an organization that promotes
the BRT technology. |
| Among the examples that the Institute provided were the
following: |
| (1) The draft EIS assumed that there would be 10 to 13 stations
built to serve the heavy rail alternative in the Dulles corridor,
but only 1 to 5 stations would be built to serve the BRT system;
|
| (2) The heavy rail stations would be 600 feet long and capable
of handling eight car trains of 120 passengers, but the stations
for the BRT system would only be 260 feet long and would be
capable of handling only four buses with a capacity of 60
passengers per bus. |
| Not surprisingly, the draft EIS concluded that significantly
fewer people would use the BRT in comparison to the heavy
rail alternative. Since the BRT system is so much less expensive
than the heavy rail alternative, there was absolutely no reason
to design the BRT for comparative purposes in a way in which
it could not possibly carry as many passengers as the heavy
rail alternative favored by Metro. |
| It was difficult for me to believe in 1999 that a vendor
would draft an EIS which would not favor the primary product
"sold" by that vendor. It now appears that my premonition
about the State¯s choice of the author of the Dulles corridor
EIS was well grounded. |
| Our elected "leaders" at the state and local level need
to stand up and call for a fair and objective study of the
alternatives. To do otherwise would be a waste of our scarce
transportation funds and cause a more than doubling of the
tolls on the Dulles Toll Road. |
| Jack Herrity |
| Former chairman, Fairfax County |
| Board of Superivors |
