Corridor discussion continues (Trans-Texas Corridor)

Paris and Lamar County are still in the loop as the Texas Department of Transportation proceeds toward a new 800-mile-long route to more efficiently move traffic from Mexico to Oklahoma, the project manager for the so-called Trans-Texas Corridor says.

TxDOT officials were at Paris Junior College from 5 to 8 p.m. Monday for the second time in four months to listen to concerns about Gov. Rick Perry’s pet project.

The meeting was one of 47 being held from the Rio Grande to the Red River from Feb. 7 to Feb. 24 in North Texas, Feb. 10 through March 10 in Central Texas and March 7 through March 31 in South Texas.

A similar meeting was held Oct. 25 in Paris, but at that time “we had just a big yellow area on a map that you were part of. Now, we have narrowed it to 10-mile-wide corridors that are the most viable routes,” said Ann Zeeck of Austin, a TxDOT public information officer.

On Dec. 16, the Texas Transportation Comm-ission hired Cintra-Zachry as the consortium to develop the Mexico-to-Oklahoma segment of the Trans-Texas Corridor — frequently referred to as TTC-35 because a major goal is to relieve congestion along Interstate 35.

Local civic leaders have lobbied for the past year to route traffic to the east of Dallas, entering Oklahoma through Lamar County to link with the Indian Nation Turnpike at Hugo, Okla., rather than entering Oklahoma at Gainesville on heavily traveled I-35 or at Denison on busy U.S. 75.

But for their first project, Cintra-Zachry in December outlined a plan to invest $6 billion in a toll road between San Antonio and Dallas by 2010. They would pay the state $1.2 billion for a 50-year agreement to operate TTC-35 as a toll facility, and TxDOT would use the money to fund improvements or high-speed and commuter rail projects along the corridor.

“You have to understand, that proposal is completely independent from the ... process we have here to identify a preferred corridor from an environmental and transportation sense,” said Dieter Billek, project manager for TTC-35.

“It’s just a proposal like any other proposal we’re looking at. It’s a proposal, but it does not mean that is the best for TxDOT.”

“The developer is coming in with ideas, and we are going to evaluate all the ideas and make this thing happen according to the needs of Texas,” he said.

On a “Preliminary Corridor Alternatives” map in the PJC Ballroom on Monday that identified about a dozen possible segments of the Mexico-to-Oklahoma route were a couple of 60-mile routes extending northeast from Interstate 30 east of Greenville toward Paris and Lamar County on the way to a link with the Indian Nation Turnpike.

One of the alternatives — N3A — is part of a proposal that would divert northbound traffic off Interstate 35 north of Waco and send it through open country along a new route that would pass north of Corsicana, through Kaufman County and east of Greenville, then northeasterly toward the Red River, passing to the west of Commerce, Cooper and Paris on its way to the Red River.

The other route — N3B — would utilize existing roadways, taking traffic from the south onto Interstate 45 near Corsicana and on to Dallas, then along I-30 to east of Greenville, then north to Oklahoma along Texas 24 through Commerce, Cooper and Paris and along U.S. 271 from Paris to the Red River.

“We’re going to evaluate existing facility and see how long the existing facility would last before capacity is reached. There’s no need to buy additional right-of-way when we use existing facilities. That does not exclude that we might have a heavy truck facility or any other facility, but we have to look at existing facility capacity,” Billek said.

The primary goal for now is to identify a preferred route. That decision should be finalized by November, Billek said. By May of 2006, officials will decide either to abort the project or to proceed with the development along the established route, he said.

Also, from the Tyler Morning Telegraph:

TXDOT PITCHES CORRIDOR IDEA TO EAST TEXANS

By ROY MAYNARD, Staff Writer, February 14, 2005

QUITMAN - Texas Department of Transportation officials are taking to the highways and byways to gather input from the public on the proposed $184 billion Trans Texas Corridor. On Monday night, officials took their presentation to Quitman.

"Our purpose here tonight is to present the project to the public, and in turn, get comments," Doug Booher, environmental manager for the Texas Turnpike Authority Division of TxDOT, told the crowd Monday - a similar crowd to ones that have averaged 100 residents.

The project is still in the initial study phase, he notes; nine potential northern routes have been identified for the first phase.

"Our next step is to compare and contract those routes, according to our evaluation criteria," said Booher.

Final federal approval is scheduled for spring 2006.

What makes the Trans Texas Corridor project unique is the financing system. The state would provide the land, but private firms would actually build the highways, in exchange for the right to collect tolls on them for as much as 50 years.

That's the aspect many East Texans wanted to discuss Monday night.

"A private company building it and charging a toll? I guess that's the wave of the future," said Jim Richards of Mineola. "I think it's a good idea."

Yantis resident Victoria Settle agreed up to a point.

"Overall, it's good," she said. "But some of the elements might not be so good. There are safety issues with the trains and trucks coming out of Mexico. I hope those will be addressed. And I hope they do a good job with the environmental impact study. A lot of the proposed routes are coming close to state parks and wildlife areas and bird sanctuaries."

Though some specifics of the planned mega-highway are controversial - farmers and ranchers oppose the envisioned width, while some communities along the state's current interstate highways oppose the route - the need for more roadway is clear, according to state Sen. Todd Staples, R-Palestine.

"The corridor concept is designed to meet critical transportation needs without raising the gas tax," he says. "It also is designed to meet the mobility crisis without diverting other needed transportation dollars."

The first phase of the project, a 300-mile stretch of tollway from San Antonio to Oklahoma border, would run parallel to Interstate 35. But the part of the project that will most affect East Texas, I-69, isn't far behind.

None of the nine proposed northern routes for the I-35 segment push very deep into East Texas. Still, serving as a new international artery, the Trans Texas Corridor would relieve pressure on other Texas highways, officials say. Without some sort of relief, forecasters note, Tyler and Smith County could soon see traffic problems like those in Dallas and Houston.

"Without a doubt, the Trans Texas Corridor will have an effect on this area," said Booher.

"It will interact with and be a part of the existing transportation structure."

Monday night's meeting was an open house.

Booher acknowledged that some have objected to the format, reasoning there's strength in numbers.

"But we feel an open house lends itself to one-on-one interaction with people," said Booher. "We can respond better to individual questions about the project. And by far, there have been more positive comments about the format than negative ones."

Ms. Settle was simply glad TxDOT was holding a comment-gathering meeting at all.

"The idea of coming to local communities for input is great," she said. "This is a big project. Everyone deserves a say on it."

A similar meeting will be held Tuesday night in Athens.

Roy Maynard covers county government and politics. He can be reached at 903.596.6291. e-mail: news@tylerpaper.com

From the thread linked in post #6:

The head of the Texas Transportation Commission, Ric Williamson, was interviewed today on KSEV radio in Houston by Dan Patrick from 5-6pm. He is in charge of the Trans Texas Corridor concept and is negotiating contract details with a company called Cintra to build the first corridor after accepting their bid. The corridor would run from Oklahoma to Mexico, roughly paralleling I-35. He answered questions, took calls, and offered new details (at least I haven't seen some of this reported before in the media) on the concept and the first corridor. Below are the points from the interview that I was able to get down.

1) While at some point a landowner might lose their land for ROW acquisition, the TTC concept will offer them perpetual royalty rights as part of the compensation package for their land. In other words, besides fair market value for their land, they and their decendents will get annual payments, just like they would if an oil company negotiated to drill on their land.

2) The concept is an intent to consolidate road, rail, pipeline, electric, communication, and other utility corridors into a single large corridor rather than individual dispersed corridors for each mode, thereby significantly reducing the total amount of land taken for the same capacity. Basically building a few big corridors instead of dozens of smaller ones(not just roads) which would divide up rural areas much more. A one and done future capacity inventory, planning, design, and buildout, rather than piecemeal and somewhat uncoordinated road and varios utilities construction that would be more ineffecient, duplicative, and less synergistic. Planned, but not built until each portion justifies itself.

3) Even if the TTC is not built, a utility corridor 400' wide for water and electric utilities would still have to be built across the state. Thus the TTC will save land by combine this utility corridor with the road corridors, (which will save land by utilizing overlapping easement requirements, shared drainage, etc.)

4) This originally wasn't scheduled to start for another 10-15 years, but they immediately began receiving proposals from private firms. After narrowing down to 3 proposals, it was decided to build now because of the higher value in the bids than expected. They then selected Cintra's bid as the best of the three, and are negotiating contract details.

5) The contract will not include any restrictions on the footprint of I-35 (meaning it can be expanded if deemed necessary or preferable.) Ric Williamson specifically stated that TX could even take the $1.2-1.4 billion payment from Cintra to pay for expanding I-35 if they wish. No restrictions.

6) Cintra puts up the money, assumes all the risk. All financing is private. TXDOT is leasing the build, operation, and maintenance rights to them, but retains ownership(basically just a subcontracting situation.) HNTB is the engineering firm working with the state on this.

7) 1st sections built would be Hillsboro-Georgetown and south of Austin to I-10 east of San Antonio, with the currently under construction Loop 130 filling in the gap. If approved next year, these portions could be finished as early as 2008-2010.

8) First 3 priority corridors are roughly parallel to I-35, to I-45, and to I-20 east from Dallas. If it gets approved, the I-69 corridor would likely also be designed as a TTC corridor. Would run roughly from Texarkana down Hwy 59, around the north side of Houston, and then parallel to the gulf to Mexico. (My addition: one would likely run to the Harlingen/Brownsville area, and one to Laredo, and similarly one would run around the east side of DFW, and one around the west.)

9) The 1200' maximum corridor width was the original expected need when the project was first considered. But after reviewing the concept the maximum ROW width can be reduced to 800-1000'(and less in sections where it is determined that there would never be a need for a particular type of rail or utility.)

10) Pulls hazmat off rail lines and highways that run through the middle of communities and into patrolled TTC corridors, which are easier to protect than multiple dispersed rail lines (many of which are not paralleled by roads and thus far harder to observe and respond to an incident.) (However nothing was said about how to fund the rail portions, which is not a part of the Cintra bid, other than space set aside in the constructed ROW for future use. Also no mention of expected timeline.)

11) TTC has not yet been reviewed by Homeland Security, but the military has stated that it is in favor of high-speed and high-capacity connections from the Gulf ports to interior bases (speeds deployment and repositioning.)

12) Talked about cost. Currently in rural areas(15 miles away from urban areas) it costs about $2 million per mile per lane to construct freeway standard roadway in 'greenspace' areas (farms, ranches, or forests.) ROW costs are about $3-6000 per acre. By comparison it averages $26 million per lane to expand roads in urban areas (because of higher land values, more complicated construction to stay within the existing footprint, etc. Layering is 3 times as expensive, which is why they are planning a wide corridor rather than a stacked one.

13) One of the guidelines given to TXDOT for evaluating whether a TTC proposal is justified is that it can't be built unless it offers more congestion relief at a lower cost than building in the existing roadway footprint.

14) We are building toll roads because the current gas tax would only fund 20% of needed road capacity. To eliminate toll roads yet still build all the road required would necessitate a $1/gallon gas tax, 80 cents higher than the current 20 cent/gallon tax. That is why toll projects will finance most new construction and expansion, where feasible.

While the usual pictures do look pretty, consider the following:

(1) The factors that are really critical in determining whether Texans are about to get shafted with this plan are missing. In particular, look for any links regarding contract details, state law, or anything else that may protect Texans. Other than some fluffy words, it is those details and the state law that will determine whether Texas build the greatest highway system, or becomes the laughing stock of the nation (right now, my vote is on the second). Remember this “project” is costing close to 200 Billion dollars, which is about $30,000 for a family of 4. This is the biggest government-orchestrated debt on the public (per capita), other than the national deficit. While private investors may be putting up the money for the system, from whom do you think they will DEMAND their money back (hint: there are not enough NAFTA trucks to come close to covering these costs)?

(2) The government will be TAKING huge amounts of land from private landowners, and virtually giving over to a private company, Cintra (based in Spain), so that the company can build a toll road and probably be able to charge whatever the market will bear – as they do today in Canada. (technically speaking, we are being told that the concession is for 50 years, but we will not know for sure until we see the contract – and 50 years of being robbed is a long time)
http://best.enigmati.ca/trans-action/200501/4601.html#start

(3) Speaking of Canada. Cintra now charges cars 19.5 US cents per mile if they have a transponder, and 23 US cents per mile (or more) if the do not have a transponder (these are peak rates, non-peak rates are about 1 cent less). Large Trucks are now charged 58 US cents per mile (peak) and 52 US cents per mile (non-peak). For the length of the highway, this is the highest toll rate in North America, and possibly the world. Cintra has won court rulings assuring them the right to continue raising tolls at will, and there NOTHING Canada can do to stop them for the next 95 years or so. Will trucks in Texas use Cintra’s toll road? It’s hard to see how, considering that the toll will be higher than many of the drivers make in the first place. These are the rates (in Canadian cents per kilometer) that Cintra charges in Canada, bottom half of this web page:
http://www.407etr.com/tolls/tolls.asp

(4) If you think that is high, another experiment with a private monopoly being allowed to charge whatever it wanted was done in California. In that case, 2 toll lanes (each way, 10 miles long) were added to the totally packed SH-91 freeway, east of Los Angeles. The toll lane operator actually prevented the state from doing a badly-needed upgrade of a nearby state-owned highway section (using its monopoly clause). It got so ugly, that Orange County had to buy the toll lanes, just to be able to do the upgrade. By the way, those lanes now charge 70 cents per mile, for cars, at peak drive times.
http://www.91expresslanes.com/tollschedules.asp
http://bicycleaustin.info/rogerbaker/tollroad-failure.html
(read the LA Times article, just over halfway down – ignore the rest of the page, it’s a left-wing site)

(5) The contract between Texas and Cintra is being negotiated and signed in SECRET. Here in Texas, Governor Perry is signing away the future of Texans (see next item), without anyone even getting to see the deal. Most governors don’t have this level of power, and the ones that do would NEVER use it this recklessly.

(6) It has been virtually promised to Cintra that they will be able to prevent ANY upgrades to STATE-OWNED highways, anywhere near their toll road. This is classic MONOPOLISTC protection, which means that the free market has been jettisoned – and replaced by a very scary collaboration of big business and big government. Market forces are not simply not possible with surface transportation, due to right-of-away issues – the question really becomes whether private companies should be able to prevent the state from doing what it needs to do on state-owned highways. Most people in this country can easily see the disaster up ahead, except supporters of Governor Perry. Note this quote from Ric Williamson, head of the Texas Transportation Commission: “…we fully expect that there will be limitations on our ability, at some point in the future, to compete with the road…” The road being Cintra’s. There certainly will be monopolistic provisions. You can find the quote buried in this transcript.
http://www.dot.state.tx.us/transcom/transcripts/1204.htm

(7) The combined state and federal gas tax in Texas is about 2 cents per mile (or 40 cents per gallon, for a car getting 20 miles per gallon). For ONE extra cent per mile (or 20 cents per gallon), Texas could easily build the FREEWAYS that it needs.

(8) State-built toll roads can work, providing that politicians are honest about how they spend the money. The State of Kentucky built a large network of toll roads, but put all of the excess toll revenue back into paying off the roads. The result: the roads got paid off much earlier than expected, and now 80% of them are freeways, and the rest charge about 2 CENTS PER MILE. However, this is the exception. In Houston, once they had a surplus, they diverted it. First to buying a toll bridge that was nearly in default (and bailing it out), then by using the money to plan new toll roads, and finally by simply diverting the money completely out of the toll road system (when they were sure no one was looking). For a state with as much corruption as Texas (just look at this SECRET deal with Cintra), toll roads are simply another way for politicians and the well-connected (like Cintra) to rob the people.
http://www.kytc.state.ky.us/toll/Natcher.htm
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/front/2994429

(9) Do toll roads increase property values and encourage development. NO, if you look at how people in the real world reacted when told that their freeway would now be a toll road. It’s real easy for the Libertarians at think tanks like Cato, Heritage, and Reason to publish white papers that essentially state that toll roads are equivalent to the second coming of Ronald Reagan. But the real world is outside of Think Tanks. The following article describes how a group of property owners (developers in this case) rescinded their offer to DONATE land to the state of Texas when they were told that their planned freeway (the Grand Parkway, a large loop around Houston) would instead be a toll road. While the Think Tanks may be have been telling them that they would become rich, their own decision to now force the state to BUY their land shows the real price of toll roads. (the article that follows is a bit tough to follow, but it confirms what did happen)
http://mypeoplepc.com/members/chrisodonnell/unitedtosaveourspring/id11.html

(10) Toll Roads are inherently inefficient. They require their own complicated system for identifying and tracking vehicles, and sometimes drivers. This adds greatly to the cost of tolls. Whereas the gas tax is already in place, thus no extra charge to collect more money. For example, if $10 needs to be collected using tolling, then $15 in tolls must be collected, with the other $5 paying for the toll collection system. With the gas tax, if $10 is needed, simply increase the gas tax so that it collects another $10. Real easy.

(11) Toll Roads are unfair. You force people to pay HUGE amounts of money to drive on certain roads, while giving a free pass on other roads (and when you do the math, you realize that 20 cents per mile, for an average car, is like paying an EXTRA $4.00 per gallon for gas). Considering that the goal should be get people ON to limited access highways, rather than PUNISHING them for doing so, one can only conclude that toll roads, as they exist today, are totally counterproductive. In fact, to be really fair, the limited access roads should be free, and the surface streets should be tolled – that way you encourage people to stop clogging up local streets and traffic lights. But we are tolled where it is convenient, not where it makes sense.

(12) Big Brother. Look for yourself, not a word about protection of privacy when you travel the Harris County toll roads or use their transponders. On the other hand, they don’t mind collecting your phone number, driver’s license number, social security number, and either bank account or credit card number (so they can pull the money out automatically). What can they do with the information. Well if you use a transponder, it’s likely that some little guy at headquarters can pull-up the information real-time and figure out when you and your wife are both 20 miles away from home (i.e., your house is empty), and call up one of their “friends”. Just an example. It used to be that privacy protection mattered to Republicans and Libertarians, I guess not with toll roads. Go through this site and their transponder application, see if there’s anything about protecting your privacy.
http://www.hctra.com/

(13) CONCLUSION - Tolls are NOT needed. They are a very inefficient way to collect huge amounts of money from the WRONG people. The gas tax has worked fine, it simply has no way to index itself for inflation. In Texas at least (and probably other growing states), an increase in the gas tax is necessary to build the roads necessary to keep traffic moving. Unfortunately, this governor will not do that, instead he is mortgaging away the future of Texas to a private company with no interest other than making us all look like idiots (as they did in Canada).

(14) HISTORY OF PRIVATELT FINANCED TOLL ROADS IN NORTH AMERICA - North America has a checkered experience with private toll roads. The Dullas Greenway, in Northern Virginia, was built privately. The Orange County Toll Road system was built publicly, but used private-sector financing, with no assurance to investors that the government would back up their investments. Both quickly failed, with the promised explosion of development not happening soon enough, if at all. Why is this important? Because future investors see these results and DEMAND lower risks and higher profits. Cintra has learned from this and is able to make a killing in North America. The problem is that its being done on the backs of drivers – it is virtually a zero-sum game.

(15) CINTRA IS VERY SHREWED – Canada learned this lesson the hard way in January. They thought that they had some control over toll rates, but the courts read the contract, and it was clear that Cintra could charge whatever they wanted, and that will hold for the next 95 years!. Are the skills of Governor Perry and his staff up to this level? Probably not. Consider that they announced the agreement with Cintra before it was finalized. This has to be about the dumbest thing you can do. Now Perry has to accept whatever Cintra offers, or otherwise walk away and look like a total fool. On this particular corridor, the Texans are about to get screwed big-time, it’s unavoidable.

(16) INCENTIVES – Monopolies operate according to a different set of incentives than regular private business. Since they already have an assured market share, their goal is to maximize profits (which is fine until you read the next sentence). Consider this hypothetical situation with Cintra: Their toll road is widely successful and starting to get crowded, so they hold a board meeting and Mr. Cintra is given two options: Option 1 - add an extra lane, Option 2 – increase tolls dramatically. This is a real easy decision – just increase tolls. That way you don’t have to pay a dime for new construction, and you get rid of the congestion. The fact that you’re choking off commerce in the state doesn’t matter – after all you’re Cintra, and all that matters is the bottom line. On the other hand, state owned highways have to answer to the taxpayers – which is about the best check you can have on this unrestrained power.

(17) THE HIDDEN MONEY – This is using approximate numbers, but the Canadians learned the hard way (something that Texans are about to do also), that the value of highway, in many cases, can be much more than the sum of its parts. In the Canadian example, the Province of Ontario built a toll road for about $1.5 Billion (highway 407, near Toronto). They then sold this road to Cintra for $3.0 Billion, and were bragging about the $1.5 Billion profit that they made. And it is true, they were able to sell that highway for much more than it cost to build. But then Cintra sold off a 25% interest of the highway, for $1.5 Billion (sorry about the repetitive numbers, but I’m trying to get as close as possible), meaning the TRUE VALUE of the highway was closer to $6.0 Billion. Where did all of this extra value come from? It came from the government, using its powers of eminent domain, to create a much

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