Hampton Roads Transit's board on Thursday authorized spending $5.7 million to study a Virginia Beach light-rail extension and possible routes to Norfolk Naval Station.
"This is a great step towards the regional vision," said Norfolk Councilman W. Randy Wright, who also serves on HRT's board.
HDR, an engineering firm, was hired to conduct a draft environmental impact statement on a light-rail line that would extend from the Norfolk city line at Newtown Road to the Oceanfront along the Norfolk Southern right of way. The Beach recently announced a preliminary agreement to buy the 10.6-mile former freight corridor for $40 million.
HDR will develop cost and ridership estimates, station locations, and other details for a possible Virginia Beach connection.
The firm, which is based in Omaha, Neb., and maintains a Norfolk office, also will conduct an alternatives analysis for connecting to Norfolk Naval Station, one of the region's largest employers.
In the late 1990s, HRT's preferred connection was along Military Highway and Interstate 64. Other alternatives studied at the time included using Hampton Boulevard, Colley Avenue, and Monticello Avenue/Granby Street.
Thursday's action also authorizes spending as much as $2.3 million more if federal regulators require additional study.
The studies will start next month and will be complete in 12 to 16 months, said Jayne Whitney, HRT's senior vice president for development.
Virginia Beach has not committed to building rail. Council members requested the study to evaluate whether the city should pursue it. Beach voters rejected light rail 56 percent to 44 percent in 1999.
Since then, Norfolk has begun building a $288 million, 7.4-mile starter light rail, and Beach leaders say support has grown in their city.
Meanwhile, Virginia Beach is eyeing the vacant Circuit City property near Town Center for a potential light-rail station.
The studies will be federally funded. HRT already has $1.5 million in federal regional transportation money to launch them. Whitney said the agency expects to receive additional federal money over the next year.
In other action, the board:
- Approved a $41.9 million contract to build a new bus operations facility on 18th Street in Norfolk. In a few months, the board is expected to approve $12 million more for an adjoining administration building.
- Authorized a two-year, $840,000 lease for the now-vacant Ford truck plant while the new bus facility is built.
- Agreed to an option to purchase two additional light-rail vehicles for the Norfolk starter line for up to $3.9 million, using federal economic stimulus money or other federal funding. Nine have already been contracted.
Debbie Messina, (757) 446-2588, debbie.messina@pilotonline.com
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Wm D Tabor DDS
Can you cite the source of this statement you made?
"Except for a portion of the Interstates subsidized through the military budget back in the 50's and 60's, roads are paid for through user fees, tolls and fuel taxes (except for the portion diverted to other uses).
Our roads are not paid for through general taxation, the users of the roads pay for them, and then some."
The study below says differently:
http://pubs.its.ucdavis.edu/download_pdf.php?id=1139
Light Rail has done no such thing in St. Louis.
Submitted by waynel77186: "Light Rail has bankrupted the regional transit in St. Louis."
First and foremost, simply because a Transit agency can't go bankrupt, by law they have to balance the budget, even if that means cutting services and selling off assets.
Additionally, light rail in St. Louis only represents about 27% of the budget outlays last year for Metro. Metro spent 2 times the amount of money that they spent on light rail last year, running buses. One third of what they spent on light rail was spent running handicapped services. And despite the fact that bus service cost more than twice as much as light rail, it didn't move twice the number of people that light rail moved.
And Light Rail works in smaller cities too!
Submitted by aalto: "'Light rail already works as mass transit in MANY large cities..........'
Agreed, however, VB is not a large city when you compare to the large cities that do have a LRT mass transit system."
Other's have already mentioned Charlotte, which while larger, isn't that much larger only about 200,000 more people.
And then there is Salt Lake City, Utah, where they currently have 3 light rail lines up and running with a daily average ridership of 44,800 people per day. They can't build new lines fast enough, and already have 4 more lines under construction. And Salt Lake City is one of the most conservative, car loving cities in this country. By the way, the population of SLC is 178,858, about half of VB's population.
fierce63
The people of VaBeach have to bombard the city council with letters demanding that this project be built.
fjaime01
" Light rail already works as mass transit in MANY large cities.........."
Agreed, however, VB is not a large city when you compare to the large cities that do have a LRT mass transit system.
And, according to the HRT concept, LRT is not a mass tranist system, but a development oriented transit system designed to spawn further over-development and create more congestion. Not to relieve any existing traffic problems.
Maybe the gov't expects the
Maybe the gov't expects the standard of living for the citizens to decline (due to lower employment opportunities, debt, global competition) that they are building up the public transit infrastructure. They don't want to tell everyone that they expect they won't be able to afford the costs associated with owning a car.
Can you guess who works/owns a subsidized company?
You know, the companies that suck up your tax dollars to build multiple HIGH DENSITY "up scale" projects. They come up with these wild projected income and tax revenue figures that never come. Of course the people who run/own these companies enjoy LARGE/HUGE SINGLE FAMILY McMansions on cul de sacs. I'll give you a big hint with this quote by one of them, "By increasing density and multi use development near the transit stops, we can provide different housing alternatives to the plethora of lots in subdivisions with cul de sacs." Yes indeed, you live in the high rise, mostly empty buildings built by these companies whose projects are subsidized with your tax dollars, while they enjoy the life of quite and luxury away from the noise and congestion with a nice large yard to enjoy. By the way, when was the last time you heard someone say, "I want to live in a noisy high rise where I can hear my neighbors arguing though the cheap walls and the elephants stomping on the floor above me." I don't think I've heard that in Hampton Roads. That quote likely came from a transplanted northerner.
We need a huge public outcry!!
The people of VaBeach have to bombard the city council with letters demanding that this debacle stop at Newtown Road. These politicians have to understand that this money did not fall from the sky. The tax dollars being wasted here come out of our pockets.
Keep building
Connect it to Norfolk Naval Station, passing ODU, and down to the beach. Future development to Hampton through the ever dreamed of "third" crossing and over to Portsmouth in a refitting of the mid-town tunnel. Will open up public transportation to many commuters.
Been to many metro areas, and Light Rail/Metro is a great way to get around.
Money Pit
Light Rail has bankrupted the regional transit in St. Louis. It will there too.
$5.7 million for another study.
I'll bet the morons are going to use the old DC current systems also.
What the heck, tax payers are footing the bill.
YOU'LL be Sorry.
.
truth in advertising would be so refreshing
This light rail project is more about tourism than anything else. It is one way to get tourist from Oceanfront, thru Pembroke, and to Downtown Norfolk.
If our local and state leaders were seriously interested in making the lives of citizens easier then there would be a serious push to have people telecommute. If people worked from home just 2-3 days a week the majority of our conjestions problem would be solved. Think about any federal holiday and how our roads become suddenly free flowing and nearly accident free.
The forces that fight the obvious here are the very same developers that profit from commercial office buildings and hotels.
The politicians don't want to decrease our dependence on fossil fuel.....how in the world would they replace the gas tax? They don't want us to use light rail to commute to work, that is why it doesn't go to major work areas, again if we all jump on the train, what happens to the gas tax?
Some will say that Downtown Norfolk is a major work area, but compared to 5 or 6 years ago this just isn't so anymore. It has become a residential and tourist/party area.
Lindowitz, we have some agreement
I agree that public schools and social security are flawed concepts, badly executed.
We should do away with both and and rely on the private sector for education and retirement planning. We could do much better.
No, Mike, motorists pay their way
Except for a portion of the Interstates subsidized through the military budget back in the 50's and 60's, roads are paid for through user fees, tolls and fuel taxes (except for the portion diverted to other uses).
Our roads are not paid for through general taxation, the users of the roads pay for them, and then some.
Naysayers
Complain away. Light rail IS going to ultimately extend from the naval base to the oceanfront regardless of your rants. In fact, please continue complaining. It makes for entertaining reading.
HRT subsidies
Dr. Tabor, your argument is inconsistent. Yes, mass transit is subsidized by taxpapers and isn't self-supporting with fares. Likewise, the roads you drive on are subsidized with income and other taxes and not self-supporting with gas taxes and user fees alone. Why is one wrong and the other right?
It won't be long now. There
It won't be long now. There will be a post coming in with statements like:
"The posters on this forum are so mis-informed. You don't know enough about the project to form a logical opinion." "HRT has hired engineers and experts that have studied and concluded that this is what the area needs to survive economically". "You're all a bunch of Grover Norquist anti-tax zealots that want to halt progress". "You just don't understand what's good for you."
No...we just want to still have a bank account that hasn't been taxed out of existence and be able to live within our means.
Public Subsidy
Well Dr. Tabor, you may buy your own car, but you and all of us who own cars depend upon a grand public subsidy every time we drive on a roadway, a bridge, and a tunnel. These public facilities simply do not in any way pay for themselves, and for you and your car (and mine too) to have access to the roadway, you must have a public subsidy to pay for it. Few would suggest that light rail will relieve traffic congestion, but in corridors like I-264 from Norfolk to the Beach, there is simply no more room to build additional lanes without condemnation of large parcels of residential and commercial property. Now that relief from the Southeastern Parkway is not in our forseeable future, we need an alternative means of public transit that does not use the already congested roadways. Since we have a ROW, underdeveloped and valued property in this corridor, means to connect via other means of public transit to the stations, we have the potential for an efficient and effective system. Let us get on with it!
doc
to use an age-old tax argument..i don't have kids. yet, i pay to educate, or UNDER-educate as the case may be, the children of norfolk. i pay social security i will never see, and countless other services are funded through my tax money. so what makes YOUR money special? and why is the obsolete technology argument only ok when you apply it to LRT, but your car is a special exemption? so when you are stuck on 264 in your traffic this summer, don't you DARE say "i wish they would use my tax money to fix this traffic". if that thought ever creeps into your head, you're a hypocrite. traffic is only going to get worse around here. suck it up or move.
Reason to build roads.
By trackermw's logic, there is no reason to ever build roads, because if you build roads, people will just fill them up with cars, and nobody wants that to happen. Roads should be empty.
There are important differences, lindowitz
Yes, the car I am driving will be obsolete in 50 years, so what, it will be worn out in 10. LRT is a long term commitment which will fall on taxpayers not yet born.
Further, if I am making an unwise investment in that car, I am doing it with my own money. I am not compelling others who will never ride it to pay 100% of the initial cost and 70% of the fuel and maintenance, as LRT, and transit in general, does by enjoying subsidies.
Finally, I am not excluding other providers of transportation from offering different choices. A subsidized HRT, protected by restrictive taxi and private bus line regulations, prevents others from offering choices that may be better suited to the market.
Let LRT and transit support themselves with their fares, and no subsidy, and allow free market competition to offer other choices and see if LRT is still appealing.