Photo by Sommer Mathis.
Yesterday, Greater Greater Washington reported a streetcar bombshell: the 11th Street Bridge, currently undergoing an extensive $300 million renovation, would not feature local streetcar tracks as previously planned. Instead, reported the blog, the Federal Transit Administration insisted that the bridge “have structural elements to make it easier to add tracks in the future,” even though that would mean adding tracks would be more expensive and take longer.
The reasoning, as reported by David Alpert:
FTA officials objected that putting tracks on the bridge could predjudice the the Environmental Assessment (EA) underway for streetcar service in Anacostia. Even though DC already has a streetcar segment under construction in part of Anacostia and has made a citywide commitment to streetcars, FTA requires them to pretend none of that exists for the purpose of thinking about Anacostia. In the meantime, they’re stopping another transit facility from being part of a project.
There are only 5 bridges connecting DC neighborhoods across the Anacostia, and they’re each rebuilt once a generation at most. The [Environmental Impact Statement] already considered the provision of transit service, which in any event has only positive environmental consequences for surrounding neighborhoods compared to single-passenger motor vehicle traffic.
Federal officials have substantial leeway within the regulations to help projects move forward more smoothly or put up obstacles. Sadly, in this case those at FTA seem to have chosen the latter. Instead, perhaps FTA should have been excited to see DC’s commitment to transit and willingness to put money, including substantial local money, behind it.
The FTA, however, is singing a far different tune about the reason for the streetcar scrap.
“Over the course of several meetings, Federal Transit Administration staff urged DDOT to incorporate the streetcar tracks into the bridge project’s environmental assessment,” said Brian Farber, an Associate Administrator for Communications and Congressional Affairs at the FTA, telling DCist that the agency had “offered three different alternative paths to get this done effectively and quickly.”
“DDOT, however, refused to follow FTA’s guidance,” said Farber. “Had they done so, they would have preserved the City’s long term options and perhaps saved taxpayer monies in the long run.”
As part of our reporting on this story, DCist also obtained a letter sent by DDOT director Terry Bellamy to the FTA dated July 28, which indicates that Bellamy was “committed to complying to the federal documentation” despite the options that Farber claims the FTA presented.
“As I think the letter indicates, we had discussions with FTA and Federal Highway, and we decided not to put the tracks in the bridge at this time,” said John Lisle, spokesperson for DDOT, indicating that the bridge will instead be built “streetcar ready.”
“We are working very closely with both FTA and FHWA and don’t want to do anything that might impact our eligibility for federal funds for the streetcar project in the future. We also don’t want to prejudice the environmental review underway in Anacostia,” Lisle added
In the end, regardless of who shoulders the responsibility for the decision, there has been a wave of consensus that not including the streetcar tracks at this time is, at best, shortsighted. But, even as Alpert notes, that’s a risk that the District had to realize it was taking when they switched the primary funding source for the project from local dollars to federal dollars in their steamrolling attempt to get the project done sooner, rather than later.
