Harrisburg Underpass

[crunchtastic]

It's pretty much a pissing match on cost projections between the East End Chamber and Metro. EEC (with buy-in from the civic clubs), is officially promoting the underpass and has hired an engineer to draw up plans that can show it done cheaper than Metro using a European design which I didn't really understand. Metro finally showed a cost breakdown for the overpass ($44 mil) , a rudimentary underpass which they deem untenable($67 mil), and a full blown tunnel ($80 mil).

Still no actual plans from Metro on what the 'arial strucutre' would look like.

So, it appears as if the EEC has a lot of local support. But there was no talk of the politics involved in moving the discussion along to Gene Green's offer of trying to secure federal funds, or find some other creative financing to make up the shortfall, if in fact there is one. As far as Union Pacific goes, the Chamber stated that they themselves have spoken with UP, who doesn't oppose an underpass.

Handouts included the metro cost projection for the three options, a draft of the letter stating the chamber's position. Nothing that I would call really authoritative, although the Chamber had some good slides about estimates on lost tax revenue from an overpass vs underpass, and line items costing 5 times more on Metro's estimate than what a similar job just cost Harris County. There was no real discussion of the plan by the alternative firm for a less expensive underpass. Good job by the EECOC on pressuring Metro into coming to the table with cost estimates.

[TheNiche]

It's pretty much a pissing match on cost projections between the East End Chamber and Metro. EEC (with buy-in from the civic clubs), is officially promoting the underpass and has hired an engineer to draw up plans that can show it done cheaper than Metro using a European design which I didn't really understand. Metro finally showed a cost breakdown for the overpass ($44 mil) , a rudimentary underpass which they deem untenable($67 mil), and a full blown tunnel ($80 mil).

Still no actual plans from Metro on what the 'arial strucutre' would look like.

So, it appears as if the EEC has a lot of local support. But there was no talk of the politics involved in moving the discussion along to Gene Green's offer of trying to secure federal funds, or find some other creative financing to make up the shortfall, if in fact there is one. As far as Union Pacific goes, the Chamber stated that they themselves have spoken with UP, who doesn't oppose an underpass.

Handouts included the metro cost projection for the three options, a draft of the letter stating the chamber's position. Nothing that I would call really authoritative, although the Chamber had some good slides about estimates on lost tax revenue from an overpass vs underpass, and line items costing 5 times more on Metro's estimate than what a similar job just cost Harris County. There was no real discussion of the plan by the alternative firm for a less expensive underpass. Good job by the EECOC on pressuring Metro into coming to the table with cost estimates.

I hope that EECOC isn't betting the farm only on proving lower costs for an underpass. They're unlikely to win out if that's the case. They should only be trying to argue that the marginal difference isn't as much as METRO is projecting (basically just by assuming away METRO's contingency budgets or some such other trick) and by arguing that whatever else the difference is, that there's enough benefit to METRO ridership, to property values, to sales taxes, etc. that it is in the financial interests of METRO and other government entities to build the underpass.

[crunchtastic]

I hope that EECOC isn't betting the farm only on proving lower costs for an underpass. They're unlikely to win out if that's the case. They should only be trying to argue that the marginal difference isn't as much as METRO is projecting (basically just by assuming away METRO's contingency budgets or some such other trick) and by arguing that whatever else the difference is, that there's enough benefit to METRO ridership, to property values, to sales taxes, etc. that it is in the financial interests of METRO and other government entities to build the underpass.

They're almost there, I think --just need more fully flush out that argument. They are focusing on narrowing the numbers, and mentioned some tax revenue but not all. I would agree totally on focusing on the broader economic argument and put some numbers to increasing ridership, property values, etc.

[JamesL]

According to this article:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/29720883/

METRO has made a compromise with the neighborhood and only the light rail will use the new bridge. My reactions:

-This is in deed better for the businesses since auto access will still be relatively easy, though there will still be a long bridge down the middle of the road.

-The "compromise" will cost the city and/or METRO less than any other alternative on the table; METRO isn't giving up anything which is why "compromise" is in quotations.

-This does the least to address the grade crossing issue, though it would thereby give light rail a competitive advantage ;-).

So, I would say, this may be preferable to the full-fledged overpass, but a (well-designed) underpass would still be better.

[TheNiche]

According to this article:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/29720883/

METRO has made a compromise with the neighborhood and only the light rail will use the new bridge. My reactions:

-This is in deed better for the businesses since auto access will still be relatively easy, though there will still be a long bridge down the middle of the road.

-The "compromise" will cost the city and/or METRO less than any other alternative on the table; METRO isn't giving up anything which is why "compromise" is in quotations.

-This does the least to address the grade crossing issue, though it would thereby give light rail a competitive advantage ;-).

So, I would say, this may be preferable to the full-fledged overpass, but a (well-designed) underpass would still be better.

I'm still a proponent of the concept of light rail on the long flyover and the road in the short trench.

This was identified as one of the intersections that would benefit the most from a grade separation out of all of Harris County, after all, and having a grade separation here would encourage traffic to continue using Harrisburg instead of being displaced onto Canal and Polk, thereby not only maintaining traffic count along a transit-served commercial thoroughfare where high traffic volumes are appropriate and contribute to business activity but also preventing higher traffic count along streets that run through primarily residential neighborhoods. There's a property tax revenue argument to be made here that I believe is very effective. This is in addition to freight train safety, elimination of noise from freight trains' horns, and improved mobility.