The Atlanta Regional Commission (ARC) has recently conceded that the TSPLOST projects list will have an insignificant impact on reducing commute times.
Taxpayers in the region are being given the opportunity to pay higher taxes for 10 years to produce little or no reduction of commute times, and obligate future transportation dollars forever, so that we will have less money available in the future to pay for projects that would have been able to alleviate traffic congestion.
There could not possibly be a worse deal for taxpayers.
If the region votes down this projects list, the Transportation Investment Act provides for the region to develop a new projects list for another vote in 2 years. That is our opportunity for a Plan B.
The Plan B process must begin by establishing sensible criteria.
n Transit projects must be designed to cost-effectively provide a commute time that is reasonably time-competitive with driving.
n Total future transit operating and maintenance costs should be capped at a level that the region can reasonably handle without future tax increases. An annual cap in the vicinity of $20 million for all new transit funded by the TSPLOST, would force the region to decide whether it wanted one boondoggle transit line, or actually start the foundation of a regional network of affordable transit connectivity.
n Regional road projects must be designed to reduce commute times in corridors that serve at least 60000 car trips per day, and where traffic flow is impacted for at least 5 miles.
n Local projects must be paid for out of each jurisdiction’s 15 percent local allocation. Regional dollars cannot pay for local projects that do not meet the above criteria.
If the above criteria were applied, I would estimate that projects consuming more than 70 percent of all TSPLOST dollars would be disqualified!
Ultra-expensive single-corridor boondoggles will not help the region achieve its alleged goal of affordable, seamless, transit connectivity throughout the region.
Previous studies, like the Regional Transit Action Plan presented a financially realistic regional transit plan. The RTAP would have provided substantial regional connectivity, at a tiny fraction of the cost of the ultra-expensive projects being proposed in the current TSPLOST projects list.
The RTAP could be updated to coordinate with GDOT’s plans for managed lanes throughout the region, to achieve even better service at an even lower cost.
Express buses have already proven to be incredibly successful in the Atlanta region. Express bus is the form of transit that is best suited to cost-effectively provide reasonable trip times to various employment centers that are widely dispersed throughout a low density metropolitan area.
An expanded network of express bus routes from communities throughout the region to employment centers throughout the region, utilizing GDOT’s planned network of managed lanes, would coordinate both increased road capacity and expanded and improved transit services. Regardless of any other warts, the I-85 toll lanes have contributed to a 29% increase in express bus ridership in the I-85 corridor.
Hopefully, GDOT has abandoned any plans to convert any more existing lanes to managed lanes. However, adding managed lanes can add road capacity, and improve commute times in all lanes, and improve transit performance.
An expanded network of express buses, providing seamless connectivity between many communities, and many scattered employment centers throughout the region, would cost taxpayers a tiny fraction of what one ultra-expensive boondoggle light rail line would cost.
In addition to the managed lanes, we also need to fund projects like the safety and operational improvements in GDOT’s Revive285 project, including projects to alleviate the bottleneck in the I-75 / I-285 interchange, which are currently unfunded. Even without the managed lanes, the interchange improvements would dramatically improve bottlenecks, and improve traffic flow throughout the top end of I-285. Revive285 shows that these improvements would reduce typical rush hour commute times on the top end of I-285 by more than a third.
There are similar projects that need funding in other interstate corridors. These are projects that could reduce commute times for hundreds of thousands of Atlanta commuters.
On the south side, Plan B would be an opportunity to restore funding to the Tara Boulevard super-arterial, which could reduce commute times for tens of thousands of commuters.
There are many projects along major arterials and interstates that could improve traffic flow, and reduce commute times. GDOT’s plans for adding managed lanes (not converting any more lanes) will improve traffic flow, and could significantly enhance the performance of transit.
Those projects would be a better investment for taxpayers. Plan B is the opportunity for taxpayers to get a good value for their money.
Ron Sifen of Vinings is president of the Cobb County Civic Coalition. His views do not necessarily reflect the views of the CCCC.
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Among the contractors listed you also need to mention everyone else associated such as Manufacturers, Fabricators, Suppliers and also the countless sub-contractors like the welders, pipe-fitters, electricans, Plumbers just to mention a few and lets not forget the guy who cleans the porta-johns. Quarrys will benifit, Steel Mills will benifit,Truck drivers will benifit.Concrete plants will benifit.There will be an increase in the sales of heavy equiptment.
This is far more reaching that you may realise.You toss those names out like they are evil entities who only live to suck the money out of taxpayers pockets but for every name mentioned there are at least one hundred other businesses associated with the road construction industry and lets not forget the tens of thousands of people that are employeed by them.
However, the current menagement and planners of the DOT are like the 'Gang the could not shoot straight'-I would not vote or give them a single new penny. They should be sent packing and replaced en masse by a competent group.
The current folks are the ones who have in 40 years not added an extra exit lane from I-285 to I-20 W, thus causing a daily many miles long bottle neck. They have allowed the highways and accesses all over and around Atlanta to become filled with trash and deteriorate for years, depite S.Perdue's promise of a fix.We present an image that is worse than many so called 3d World countries.Have you driven on W.Paces Ferry? A street with the Governor's Mansion is rutted and potholed-for years! It is only now that the new T-Splost is to be voted on, that they have deigned to start trash pick up.
No,again, these folks need to resign in shame or be fired.There must be competent people who can plan and fix our problems.What about it, Governor Deal?
There's a closed "Park and Ride" not far from where I live. The entrance is gated and the pavement is riddled with weeds. I wonder how much that lot cost the taxpayers and whether we're still paying for it.
I pay $6.50 for a daily round trip from the Marietta Transfer Station to Downtown. The total mileage is about 34 miles. Since I have to pay to park, the Xpress is less money even before considering the possible savings from wear and tear on the car.
I can shoose from five departures in the morning and six in the evening. The bus is clean and usually at about half capacity. I arrive to work nice and relaxed as opposed to frazzled and angry.
I'm sold, and if you could see how many car drivers are playing with their phones, you would want to ride the bus with me too.
Could you share your plans to remedy I-75 at I-285? How will you finance your proposed projects? The tea party wants to raise the gas tax!! What say you? How will your projects impove traffic? Will the express bus serve Mableton? Will it take me downtown? To the airport? How will you finance the maintenance of your projects? Do you have the support in the legislature and governor's office to approve another SPLOST referendum?
Your county has used SPLOST programs since the 1980's and has been quite successful with them. What would traffic look like if Cobb had not invested $2 billion in transportation improvements?
Your continued opining reminds me of an old Wendy's commercial......"Where's the beef?" Enough fluff! Publish your project list and financing plan. Saying "NO" is not a Plan B.
Georgia Public Policy Foundation recently issued an independent objective professional analysis of the TSPLOST projects. They pointed out that rail works in high density places and that Atlanta is the lowest density major city in the world. GPPF presented extensive information supporting why bus options would work better than rail in the Atlanta region.
No legislation is required for Plan B. The existing TIA law authorizes any region that rejects its projects list to put together a new projects list and come back for a new vote in 2 years. There is no reason for Atlanta to attempt to reimpose the same failed projects list. If Atlanta really wants to use TIA to alleviate traffic congestion, Atlanta already has the authorization to put together a completely different projects list that actually would help to alleviate traffic congestion. Sifen's Plan B would do a better job of alleviating traffic congestion than the current list.
Part of the problem with Metro Atlanta's approach to transit financing is that, in an attempt to make and keep transit affordable for the lowest-income and most downtrodden commuters, we have priced transit fares entirely too low, which has in effect severely-limited the funding needed to actually make transit appealing and convenient to the people who actually make up most of the SOV's(single-occupant vehicles) the make up the majority of vehicles stuck in really bad traffic congestion on the roads.
Forget the T-SPLOST or tax increase method of financing transit, or roads even, as tax increases to finance transit lines is totally unnecssary.
If a transit line cannot be self-supporting with the use of USER FEES in the form of adequately-priced fares high-enough to help finance the initial construction and continuing operations and maintenance of the line throughout the rest of its lifespan going forward, then it does not need to be built.
We would be wise to completely max-out on road expansion (widening and expansion of every major road in Cobb County and Metro Atlanta, doubling of freeway capacity, etc) before we continue with expanding the same increasingly-flawed mismanaged bare-bones transit approach in a misguided attempt to keep transit affordable for the poorest of the poor.
Unpopular? Yes. Equitable? YES.
Also, if you make the traffic, then pay for the solution. But don't force those who have no stake in these solutions to pay for them. Too many people in the Atlanta Area have a 'free-rdie' when it comes to their ability to just 'jump onto the highway' at peak times for no cost. These are the same who complain the most.
If we all agree that transportation is a major issue that needs to be addressed then what is going to prevent us from coming together and formulating a realistic solution the second time around?
The only reason, I can think of that a follow up effort would fail is because the current proponents are not getting their way.
If it doesn't benefit them directly they are not going to be interested.
Let's vote this current TSPLOST down, start another effort and see who steps up and who does not.
Then we will see who REALLY wants to address our transportation issues.
The true believers will be revealed and the crooks will fall by the wayside.
If the Region Powers don't want to entertain Plan B, Cobb can do even more improvements with an old fashioned, Cobb only, SPLOST.... and we would be able to spend all the money rather than just what the Region decides to "send back".
Sifen has presented a reasonable alternative. Vote NO July 31st and do Plan B.
I agree.
Based on the estimated sales tax collections of the 2011 Cobb TSPLOST of $492 Million for four years, an estimated ten year collection amount would be right around $1.230 Billion.
Not so coincidentally it is about the same amount as we are being allocatedt in the current Regional TSPLOST. Maybe a little more.
The difference is, of course, that we (Cobb County) would control the money ourselves and not be sending it to GDOT, GRTA or some other mismanaged, out of control state agency.
I think most of the other counties in the Atlanta Region could do the same thing and make out just as well financially and also control their own destiny. I don't know that for sure, because I did not make those individual county calculations.
The only entities that would likely suffer under this local TSPLOST Plan B scenario would be the City of Atlanta and MARTA.
So
Our Cobb County Plan B would be to collect just as much revenue over a ten year period, control our own dollars and have at least some semblance of control over our local politicians and bureaucracies
or
Go with Plan A, give our revenues to state bureaucracies over which we have no control and that have proven time and again that they are inefficient, corrupt and mismanaged.
I vote for Plan B.
However,
I do have some concerns about the viability of bus service simply from the standpoint of the perception of riding buses in the South.
It doesn't make sense, but it is a cultural issue that will be difficult to overcome.
Maybe financial necessity will be able to help resolve that ridiculous stigma. I hope so.
The second flaw in your "Plan B" scenario is that it doesn't jive with the wishes of the power brokers (political and business) that formulated the TIA project list in the first place.
Most of the projects in the TIA are their for their own enrichment and benefit. That's why they are spending multi-millions of dollars on a propaganda campaign to sell their bogus bill of goods to the public.
A few projects that actually make sense (mostly expressway interchange improvements) were thrown in. But that was only so that the boondoggle aspect of the list wasn't so blatantly obvious.
Like you said about 70% of the projects could be immediately eliminated because they are not aimed at effectively reducing traffic congestion and/or addressing regional transportation problems and issues.
They are aimed at the pocket books of the special interest groups who concocted this $7 Billion scam in the first place.
Plan B is a potential alternative, but only if the taxpayers can effectively wrest the power from those individuals and agencies that put together the first project list.
but I am sure that is the aim of yourself and Mr. Sifen anyway. Do nothing would suit you just fine.
Who are the special interests you are talking about? Be specific!
For just a few of the special interest beneficiaries read I16's post below.
I will add MARTA, the City of Atlanta and GRTA from the public domain.
To identify the private sector beneficiaries just look at the people who are contributing big bucks to MAVEN and the other propaganda machines that are trying to cram the TSPLOST down our throats by carpet bombing the public with half truths and misinformation about the supposed "benefits" of approving the TSPLOST.
and
Plan B is not about doing nothing. It is about doing the RIGHT thing that actually addresses our regional transportation issues.
The epitomy of doing nothing is the current TIA project list.
Mark is on the ARC, so he KNOWS they now say the projects won't do what they originally said.
Will he do the right thing, or continue to push for these silly ideas?
Atkins, Croy eng, Pbsj, Ma, Cobb Dot, Ga Dot.
Mr. Moreland, David Hankerson, Tim Lee, Mark Matthews, Chip Rogers, Nathan Liberal Deal and others.
VOTE NO TSPLOST.
Pretty unbelievable anti-business talk.
Don't be so myopic and ignorant.
No one has a problem with private sector businesses benefiting from legitimate and effective transportation projects.
That's the problem. The current TIA project list is a money wasting debacle!!
It is the LIST stupid!!
When multiple individuals talking points consists of anti-business rhetoric and conspiracy theories regarding the RTR and who is going to benefit, whithout any facts, just conjecture, it is easy to see who is ignorant.
If you don't like the list, don't vote for the list. If you don't like the process, blame the General Assembly and the folks who voted for this process.
Don't concoct some wild eyed stories and disparage good hard working private sector organizations for supporting this effort.
You sound like a bunch of Occupy Wall street twits and that is myopic and ignorant personified.
For anyone who is willing to look objectively at the ridiculous TIA project list, take note of who is spending big money to support it and then make some common sense deductions, it is pretty clear as to the intent of what is being proposed.
As for the hardworking transportation oriented private sector businesses that support the TSPLOST.
Do they really have a choice?
If they opposed it or just didn't wholeheartedly support it, that would be duly noted and if the TSPLOST passed they would likely be effectively blacklisted when it came time to select consultants or contractors.
If you are just to naive or simply aren't astute enough to recognize that, it's not my problem.
It's right in front of you if you care to look closely enough.
As for the TIA process, the Members of the General Assembly did not anticipate that the legislation they passed would be purposely perverted by the members of the Roundtable to create their own personal slush fund of projects.
The legislators built in some flexibilty on purpose, but they didn't expect that flexibility to be so carelessly and selfishly abused.
The legislators were too worried about breaking some pledge they signed from Grover Norquist to fund this directly with a state wide tax, or come up with a list of priorities and projects themselves so we have this process. It is not perfect mind you but the process worked.
If you got 21 leaders from this region in a room again and looked at the list of projects I am pretty sure many of if not the same list of projects would rise to the top and be selected.
What you are advocating for is to vote this down and wait two years and do it all over again. Guess what, that won't happen. There is no political will from the State leaders, Members of the General Assembly or likely any of the roundtable members to do this over in two years.
A NO vote is a vote to do nothing because that is what will happen.
Ron Sifen knows it, you know it and the rest of the folks against this know that and that is exactly what you really want to happen.
BUT, the business community is not willing to pony up their own dollars to make it happen. It makes no business sense to them except to the extent that they get to do the work with other people (taxpayers) paying the bill.
Take your load of blather and send it off to whereever they sent Sam Olens and Hankersons' mules, please.
It's hard to imagine that you can't see this TIA fiasco for what it is?
My greatest fear about this issue is that there will be more than 50% of the voters out there who are like you and lapping up the pro TSPLOST propaganda as if it is the truth.
What is being proposed in the TIA/TSPLOST, for the most part, is not a solution to our regional transportation and congestion issues.
However you are correct when you say that the private business leaders you mentioned are doing what they think is best for THEIR investments.
You have unwttingly identified the root of the problem.
They can't, or just refuse, to look beyond their own immediate business interests and seriously consider the larger picture for the Metro Atlanta region.
As a result of their narrowly focused, self interested motivation the future of the Metro area is in jeopardy. They will benefit in the short run, but in the long run the sustainability of the region will be damaged.
Plan B is not, as you contend, about doing nothing. It is about doing the RIGHT thing for the Metro area.
If the T-SPLOST is voted down, Plan B will likely never come to pass as many state politicians are openly talking about passing legislation to void and eliminate the process of remaking a list for yet another vote in two years which no lawmaker really wants to do then as 2014 will be a Gubernatorial election year here in Georgia.
In fact, if they really wanted to get more bang for the buck, the state would do well to ELIMINATE and ABOLISH THE GAS TAX FOR ALL GEORGIANS by just simply charging mileage-based USER FEES on each major road, making each major road fully SELF-FUNDED.
The state could retain the gas tax on all out-of-state vehicles and drivers and even raise it to gain more money for road construction and maintenance.
Will this be something that is self-reported or do you advocate some sort of tracking device be placed on every vehicle with a GA license plate on it.
How about all of the other cars from other states that drive our roads and highways every day? How do you expect to keep track of their miles traveled and send them a bill?
Have you really thought this idea through any more than you have thought through the other wild ideas you have expressed in these pages?
Does anyone else suspect the TIA folks for this "good" news.
Do you not see this possiblity as in fact GOOD news? Just amazing people seem so ant-business in these blog pages recently.
Kiplingers online was the source listing Atlanta as one of 8 cities expected to see job growth.
The point is that the pro TSPLOST people are insinuating that only minimal job growth is going to be possible without the passage of the TSPLOST.
They are holding out the TSPLOST as the one and only hope for job growth in the Atlanta Metro area and if we don't pass it that our community will whither up and die.
Can you say scare tactics?
You are correct about our history regarding transportation.
For the most part the existence and subsequent progress of Atlanta is based on being a transportation hub.
The exception might be MARTA and that is a management problem not an infrastructure problem.
Where I think we diverge in our opinion is that the previous transportation advancements you mentioned were the right projects at the right time for the right reasons.
This TSPLOST does not reflect the good judgement that was exhibited in regard to those other projects.
It is a collection of the WRONG projects for the WRONG reasons.
Sure we need to do something, but it needs to be effective and financially responsible.
This TSPLOST is neither.
I just want to know how you define them.
The I-85 Corridor Transit Study TIA-GW-031 No infrastructue improvements; no impact on regional congestion issues
The McCollum Airport Improvements TIA-CO-018 and 020 Non traffic related and no impact on regional congestion issues
The missing projects at I-75/I-285 interchange and I-285 between I-75 and Perimeter Mall, are where the congestion lies.
Plan B can put the boondoggle money where the real needs are.
This list really is bad. Vote NO July 31st.