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Toll road partisan keep shouting past one another, sidestepping the real questions
By Michael Lindenbarger
Dallas Morning News blog
May 1, 2012
The Mayor's Facebook page has invited Dallas residents and others to weigh in on what he ought to do regarding the Trinity Parkway toll road. And boy have they. At last count, 191 folks weighed in with comments.
Mayor Mike Rawlings is asking because he has said he wants to make a decision about where he'll stand on the issue, now that the FHWA is poised to decide later this year where and if the toll road can be built. The NTTA will hold a public hearing Tuesday to get public input, and Mike Rawlings will say tomorrow at a press conference what his input will be.
One of the few folks on the facebook page who stuck up for building the toll road was the former Trinity River Project Manager, Rebecca Razor. Here's here argument, and I am highlighting it because the arguments obscure some of the important questions that have been the reason why this project has remained controversial.
I may be the lone voice here, but here's a few facts. In the ballot language in the 1998 Bond Program, it specifically says "the Trinity Parkway". So people knew what they were voting on, and that is a portion of what the voters approved. If you do away with the Parkway, you are going against what the voters voted on. Also, in the bond booklet published by the City, it stated that the Parkway was under consideration as a tollroad. It was also mentioned numerous times in the newspapers and ads (both for and against) that it was being considered as a tollroad. Another point - in our interlocal agreement with the NTTA, the City is prohibited from taking any action that would go against having the Parkway. Only the NTTA can shelve the project. Finally - we need traffic congestion relief in order to get rid of our ozone problem. DART has not stepped up to provide a solution, and ridership has not made a dent in the congestion to date.
Let's break that down a bit.
In the ballot language in the 1998 Bond Program, it specifically says "the Trinity Parkway." So people knew what they were voting on, and that is a portion of what the voters approved.
This is a bit disingenuous, or at least misses the point. The question should be what did voters understand the word 'parkway' to be? Was it always going to be a six-lane highway with 55 MPH speeds? My colleague Rodger Jones points out that as early as 1999 or 2000 there were public documents attesting to the idea of building the road as a highway. But that's after the 1998 bond election and -- just as importantly in the context of the 2007 election and today -- before former mayor, and once staunch toll road opponent, Laura Miller changed her tune after embracing a compromise known as the Balanced Vision Plan.
The question after that plan was did the public who was asked to support the Balanced Vision Plan envision the Trinity Parkway to be the mostly stripped-down toll road it's expected to be now? I haven't seen much to suggest so, but the City's long-standing statement that the voters knew what they were getting fails to address either of these questions, and therefore is not persuasive.
If you do away with the Parkway, you are going against what the voters voted on.
She is referring to the 1998 vote, and as explained before, that's hardly a logically required conclusion as she suggests here.
Also, in the bond booklet published by the City, it stated that the Parkway was under consideration as a tollroad. It was also mentioned numerous times in the newspapers and ads (both for and against) that it was being considered as a toll road.
I think the record is clear that proponents of the road have long seen the road as a toll road. But it's not clear that such understanding was communicated at all -- or certainly with adequate volume -- to the public prior to 1998.
It's also important to note that after the 1998 vote, opposition to the road grew so strong that one of its chief opponents was elected mayor. That the road continued after her election is a result of a compromise that was reached, as I noted above. After the compromise, voters' perceptions of the road were reset.
Did they know, much less demand as Razor suggests, that the road under consideration would be a toll road like the $1.8 billion one planned now? The city's talking points, as with Razor's points here, don't address that nuance and it's a critical factor.
Another point - in our interlocal agreement with the NTTA, the City is prohibited from taking any action that would go against having the Parkway. Only the NTTA can shelve the project.
I am not sure that's legally so. (Lawyers reading feel free to jump in here.) Contracts are made to be broken, and usually damages for such breaches are contemplated in the original agreement. To say the city can't change its mind would be a very powerful statement indeed. I wouldn't bet on it. The question, not addressed here, would instead be what are the consequences if it did change its mind?
Beyond the legalities, who would believe the NTTA would insist it be built? Yes, for all its denials in 2007 and beyond, I did find a letter proving that NTTA wrote a strongly worded letter to the city urging it to keep the toll road. I don;t have that letter in front of me, but it was in 2006 or before.
But despite that, NTTA has no money for the road. None. Even if it insists that the road go forward, it would only be doing so with its fingers crossed behind its back -- or, to be more polite, with the understanding that it wants to build the road, but only if someone else contributes hundreds of millions, if not $1 billion or more, to make it affordable.
Finally - we need traffic congestion relief in order to get rid of our ozone problem.
Here's an argument that is harder to dispense with. The new toll road would get traffic moving again. No kidding. No denying this, though opponents often do. It's also true that fast-moving traffic pollutes less than stalled traffic.
But we also know that more capacity will lead to more traffic. It will take some time for the new traffic to overwhelm the capacity, and return to gridlock. When it does, and if the toll road is at a stop too, there will be six new lanes of stalled traffic producing pollution. Will the temporary reduction in pollution have been worth it? Or will be worse off as a result of the new lanes of traffic?
Another wrinkle: Defenders of the road will rightly point out that toll roads won't back up quite as quickly as free lanes, since many drivers won't want to pay, or because toll rates could be raised in the future to keep traffic thin. That's true, but if drivers avoid tolls then the traffic on the free lanes will remain gridlocked. So where's the pollution benefits there? And eventually, even the toll lanes will be jammed at times -- as the DNT is.
DART has not stepped up to provide a solution, and ridership has not made a dent in the congestion to date.
She may have a point here, but doesn't seem to be one that would control the decision about the parkway. It is true that ridership hasn't made a dent yet, but the Orange Line will take folks from Dallas to Irving. That's directly providing relief that the toll road will provide, though no doubt only a portion of it. That's not really not stepping up. But beyond that, when I asked Michael Morris of NCTCOG earlier this month about the need for other solutions to your traffic problems beyond more toll roads, he insisted -- just like the city has for years -- that other solutions are being used. They just aren't sufficient to render the toll road superfluous.
I am spending this time and space on Razor's comments not to demonize her. She's among the most dedicated and open city officials I've worked with, in any of the cities touched by transportation decisions I've written about.
But her arguments help crystallize why this interminable debate about the toll road persists. Its supporters offer answers that are close, but not quite, on target to the questions they are attempting to avoid.
There really shouldn't be much mystery here. Here's what folks need to know about the road:
* In 1998, did they expect it to be the kind of road that it became?
* If so, did opposition to that vision lead to a compromise under Mayor Miller?
* Is the road of 2007 a fair reflection of what voters thought the compromise had produced?
In 2007, the voters answered that question. They supported the road in its current, more or less, incarnation.
* Did the city play straight with the voters in describing the process, and consequences of the road in 2007?
* Have problems with the levees been serious enough to require officials or, ultimately, voters to reconsider the question?
And finally, based on the most recent report:
* Does the admission that the road will raise flood waters during a 100-year event put Dallas at risk? Or, as NTTA says, is that small elevation manageable.
* Does that admission mean the Corps will not approve the project? Has the corps changed its standards to make that approval more likely?
* If the road is built, what delays or reductions or intrusions will that mean for the parks? Are they as the city described them in 2007? If so, opponents probably don't have a leg to stand on.
Finally, the biggest question is this: What happens if we don't build the road? Will the short term traffic problems be able to be addressed by other, less traditional methods?
Will the fact that those other methods, whatever they are, do not involve new highways and more cars in downtown Dallas pay dividends over the years that will make the temporary traffic problems that follow a decision to not build the road look like reasonable price to pay for a better Dallas 20 or 40 years from now?
I think an honest discussion of all those questions would do more toward putting this issue to rest, one way or another, than asserting answers to questions that actually beg the questions.
If Rawlings and others in charge want to push the toll road forward, they would all be better off -- as would the rest of us -- if they stopped sidestepping the questions. If they answered them, if they can, opponents would be left with the choice of accepting defeat or bringing another referendum.
The latter isn't easy and the former tastes bad. But anything is better than having the two sides continue to shout past one other as this project lingers (seemingly) forever like an unpleasant aroma in a car whose windows don't roll down.