[RP TownTalk] [HOPE_in_Hyattsville] Roads for Transit -- Re: Anyone have any updates on the purple line

[Melissa Avery]

Greg -
forwareded this to Town Talk in riverdale Park




________________________________
From: Greg Smith <gpsmith at igc.org>
To: HOPE_in_Hyattsville at yahoogroups.com
Sent: Tue, January 25, 2011 8:36:05 AM
Subject: [HOPE_in_Hyattsville] Roads for Transit -- Re: Anyone have any updates 
on the purple line

  


Regarding the Purple Line and other rail transit projects v. highway 
projects like the Intercounty Connector....

Under federal law, the majority of federal highway dollars flowing to 
Maryland and other states are "highway dollars" in name only.

Every state has the right under federal law to flex significant percentages 
of its few federal highway dollars toward public transit investments, e.g. 
the Purple Line the DC area or the Red Line in Baltimore.

Maryland can flex a higher percentage of its federal highway dollars to 
public transit because the Washington and Baltimore regions have congested 
interstates and air quality that fails to meet health-based criteria for 
smog and fine particles.

In fact, Maryland can flex about 75 percent of its federal highway dollars 
toward public transit capital projects, e.g. the Purple Line in the DC area 
and/or the Red Line in Baltimore and/or rail out the I-270 corridor.

Even better, Maryland can attract a matching federal grant for new rail 
projects, also called New Start projects.

So $1 billion dollars in state transportation, or federal highway dollars 
flexed by a state to public transit, or some combination of the two, could 
attract $1 billion federal transit dollars in a matching grant for, say, 
the Purple Line.

So when Martin O'Malley decided to proceed with the ICC, and to waste $1 
billion in federal highway funding and another $445 million in state 
transportation dollars on that one 18-mile toll road, he essentially 
decided to blow what could have been nearly $3 billion for public transit.

And that's not the end of it. O'Malley also decided to issue $1.2 billion 
in additional debt for the ICC, on which the interest owed is likely to run 
about an additional $1.2 billion.

So the total price tag on the ICC, in nominal dollars, is about $4 
billion.... for a destructive toll road that every study shows will not 
relieve congestion.... while transit is not built or maintained, roads 
crumble, roads that unsafe for pedestrians remain unsafe for pedestrians, etc..

The major underwriters on the ICC bonds include the many of the same 
financial luminaries who brought us the derivative-fueled housing and debt 
bubble, including Goldman-Sachs.

That's what you call screwing Main Street to enrich Wall Street.

Greg


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