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House panel will look at transportation bucks
A specially formed committee of Texas House members will study transportation funding over the next several months and recommends legislation for the 2011 session, House Speaker Joe Straus’ office announced this afternoon.
State Rep. Larry Phillips, R-Sherman, and Eddie Rodriguez, D-Austin, will co-chair the House Select Committee on Transportation Funding. The committee, according to the speaker’s office, will “review the effectiveness and efficiency of current funding options.”
Texas transportation funding, based for decades on gas taxes and then for a few years heavily on toll roads, is at a crossroads. The gas tax, unchanged since 1991, has lost considerable ground to inflation and the Legislature has resisted raising the levy. Meanwhile, taxpapers and legislators alike have rebelled against an over-reliance on toll funding. Last season, legislation to give local communities the option to raise the gas tax or other fees for transportation failed in the session’s final days.
The committee will include the following members: Patricia Harless, R-Spring; Todd Hunter, R-Corpus Christi; Ruth McClendon, D-San Antonio; Joe Pickett, D-El Paso (also the chairman of the House Transportation Committee); Vicki Truitt, R-Keller; Ryan Guillen, D-Rio Grande City; Roberto Alonzo, D-Dallas; Bill Callegari, R-Katy; Edmund Kuempel, R-Seguin; Armando Martinez, D-Weslaco; Wayne Smith, R-Baytown; and Senfronia Thompson, D-Houston.
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Traffic around crash site moving ‘pretty good,’ official says
UPDATE 3:36 p.m.: The northbound and southbound access ramps to and from U.S. 183 to Loop 360 have been opened for several hours and traffic is moving “pretty good” said John Hurt, a spokesman for the Austin district of the Texas Department of Transportation.
The southbound frontage road of 183 adjacent to the Echelon 1 building will be closed indefinitely as an investigation continues.
All other roads in the area are moving, officials said.
EARLIER:
The plane crash earlier this morning has closed an access road on U.S. 183, but officials won’t be closing the highway, state transportation officials said.
According to John Hurt, a spokesman for the Austin district of the Texas Department of Transportation, “Right now all the main lanes are open (on U.S. 183), so unless there’s a compelling reason, there will be no reason to close them.”
The access road between Loop 1 and 360, on the north side of 183 “will probably be closed a good part of the day, if not wholly then at least partially” for emergency vehicles. Because of the likely continued closure of that frontage road, he recommended that drivers going northbound on 183 this evening who wish to go southbound on 360, take a detour south on Loop 1 (MoPac), and taking Spicewood Springs or Far West Blvd. westbound. Drivers can also take Loop 1 north and then connect to 360 southbound.
With drivers looking at the accident site, “the whole area is going to be congested this afternoon,” he said. “But there’s no closure planned for the main lanes.”
A plane crashed into this building in north Austin earlier today.
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New Second Street detours start Monday
FROM THE CITY OF AUSTIN:
Downtown’s Second Street will move into a new phase of construction next week, continuing the Great Streets Program project into its second phase of improvements along the downtown corridor.
On Monday, February 15, work will begin on the south side of Second Street between Colorado and Congress Avenue.
Eastbound traffic on Second Street will be detoured around the block by turning south on Colorado to Cesar Chavez, then west on Cesar Chavez to Congress, and north on Congress to Second Street.
The work on the south side of Second Street is scheduled to take approximately 45 calendar days.
After completion of the work on the south side of Second Street, work will shift to the north side, at which time westbound traffic on Second Street will be detoured. Updates will be posted on the City’s website before traffic plans go into effect.
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Cap Metro hires Hamilton as fiscal consultant
UPDATED AT 1:10 P.M.
Capital Metro, saying that over the next six months it wants “to take steps to improve its financial sustainability,” has given a consulting contract to Billy Hamilton, who for many years was Texas’ deputy comptroller.
Hamilton, who will work about 20 hours a week for the next six to eight months, would make between $38,000 and $50,000 under the contract, said Capital Metro spokesman Adam Shaivitz. Hamilton, according to a press release, will work on “financial planning, financial performance measurements, budget processes and communication to various stakeholder groups.”
“Hamilton served as deputy comptroller for Carole Keeton Strayhorn and her Democratic predecessor, John Sharp. As deputy comptroller, he was responsible for running the day-to-day operations for the state’s chief treasurer, revenue estimator, accountant and tax collector.
“Hamilton also served on special assignment to the State of California to conduct a performance review and has advised the World Bank on issues of public debt management, performance management and tax policy. Hamilton has more than 20 years of executive-level financial experience and is a graduate of the University of Texas and the LBJ School of Public Affairs.
“He joined Capital Metro this week and will work closely with Interim President/CEO Doug Allen and Executive Vice President of Finance and Administration Randy Hume.”
“Billy Hamilton is one of the most highly-respected financial experts in the state if not the entire country. He will serve Capital Metro and the citizens of our service area well as we focus on this important initiative and strengthen our agency for the future,” Allen said in a statement today.
Hamilton’s hirings comes as Capital Metro struggles to right its finances and open a new rail line. The agency has been operating with a cushion of only a few days of reserves, less than $10 million. Sales tax revenue — estimated at $134.1 million this year — have nosedived because of the recession.
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A new bridge over Lady Bird Lake?
The City of Austin is considering building a rail bridge over Lady Bird Lake among three alternatives for extending a proposed light rail or streetcar line from downtown to south of the river.
The bridge likely would be in the first phase of building the rail line, which ultimately would go from the Mueller development in Northeast Austin, through UT and downtown, and east to the airport. The city and its consulting engineers are in the final stages of settling on a preferred route and will unveil it Feb. 25 in a briefing to the Austin City Council.
However, city transportation director Rob Spillar said today that the Feb. 25 map will not specify how to get across Lady Bird Lake, instead leaving as possibilities Congress Avenue, South First Street or a new bridge. In fact, Spillar said, that question is likely to remain unresolved until sometime after voters are given a say on the proposed urban rail in the form of a bond election, which could be as soon as November.
“We’re not ready to make that recommendation until we get detailed environmental and engineering studies,” Spillar said, studies that would be much costlier than the current preliminary engineering work. “And I don’t think we can do that until we get voter approval.”
A river crossing, he said, likely would cost $20 million to $25 million no matter whether it involved retrofitting an existing bridge or building a new one.
A map on display this week at several “mobility” forums hosted by the city shows that possible new bridge extending south from Brazos Street, crossing the river and then cutting across the western section of the American-Statesman’s property. But Spillar said that location, while it has some advantages, is not set in stone and that such a bridge could be located anywhere from east of there to west of the South First bridge.
“We put a line on there (the map) for discussion purposes,” Spillar said. “We’re not after you guys.”
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TxDOT ponders Oak Knoll tree vandalism caper
The tree assassins have come in the dead of night each time, on a weekend and at this time of year. The toll so far: about 10 shortish trees and three mountain laurel bushes that the Texas Department of Transportation had planted along U.S. 183 near Oak Knoll Drive.
Motive? A high school prank? Someone who doesn’t like TxDOT? Mardi Gras? Who knows.
“It’s just weird,” said John Hurt, spokesman for TxDOT’s Austin district.
The first incident occurred a year ago, according to Marie Moore, who lives in the nearby Summit Oaks neighborhood. Someone came along and took the tops off about 10 trees that TxDOT had planted in a strip of median between the elevated highway’s northbound lanes and the Oak Knoll exit ramp. They left behind naked tree trunks six or seven feet high. The branched parts of the trees were dumped beside the frontage road on the opposite side.
Then whoever it was came along a week later and sawed off the trunks down to six inches or so. The trunks joined the branches over on the other side of the frontage road. TxDOT filed a report with the Austin Police Department at the time reporting the vandalism, Hurt said, but nothing much happened after that. Tree assault likely falls below many other crimes that the police have to handle.
Then, the weekend of Jan. 30 this year, more carnage. Moore said someone came along and mowed down the three 10-foot-tall mountain laurels, dumping them with the refuse from a year ago. The mounting pile has migrated out of the TxDOT right of way and onto private property.
Hurt wasn’t aware of any other such vegacide occurring on other TxDOT property in the area, and said he hopes a little sunshine on the situation might prevent more from happening. Hurt, although he didn’t yet have dollar figures, said such plantings alongside TxDOT roads (done for erosion control and beautification purposes) are expensive. Given that, he wasn’t sure that these trees and bushes will be replaced.
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Skaggs, Daugherty share tollway thoughts with Hutchison
Former Travis County Commissioner Gerald Daugherty and Jim Skaggs, his wingman in advocating for roads over rail transit over the past dozen years, have a message for Kay Bailey Hutchison: stop using toll roads as a whipping boy in the gubernatorial race with Rick Perry.
Daugherty and Skaggs, who came to political prominence in Austin in the late 1990s in a fight to lower Capital Metro’s sales tax rate, sent a joint letter to the GOP senator taking issue with her characterization of certain toll roads as “double taxation” and her criticism of Perry’s private toll road leases.
The letter does not endorse Perry over Hutchison in the March 2 primary, where the two will appear on the GOP gubernatorial ballot with Wharton small business owner Debra Medina. Perry and Medina, in fact, are not even mentioned.
Here’s the letter:
Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison 961 Federal Building 300 East 8th Street Austin, TX 78701 February 2, 2010
Dear Senator Hutchison:
We share respect for your dedication and many accomplishments in your long service representing Texas as US Senator. It was a great disappointment that your campaign chose to substantially misrepresent and distort the characteristics and value of toll roads, casting them as liabilities to society rather than positive assets which have proven to be one of the important elements in addressing our growing mobility needs. Increased mobility has been directly related to improved quality of life for many hundreds of years. Today, mobility is vital to many aspects of our daily lives including access to affordable homes and greater opportunities.
We understand you may be influenced by your campaign’s perception of “political” necessity. However, you are highly regarded and your misrepresentation and influence will mislead many people. This will degrade or impede the future progress of many who have worked so hard to improve mobility in our communities. Contrary to your TV ads, the current toll roads in Central Texas are not converted tax roads and do not represent “double taxation.” In many cases, toll roads are funding additional “free” road lanes which are substantially improving mobility for both those who choose to use toll roads and those who choose to not use toll roads.
To a great extent, Mobility throughout the US has been dramatically degraded by governments at national, state and local levels continuing to divert greater portions of highway fund dollars to other uses. At the national level, some 20% of the highway gas tax funds are diverted to public transit and earmarks. At the Texas State level, about 50% of gasoline tax revenues are diverted to other uses such as education. Clearly, it would be more constructive to apply all highway funds to highways and to more directly address the funding issues of other needs.
These fund diversions and the continuing decline of gas tax revenues per passenger mile, due to greater vehicle efficiency and alternative fuel/power, coupled with no increases in per gallon gas tax amounts, have reduced roadway funding to an unsustainable level that cannot support needed mobility infrastructure.
As we have seen here in Central Texas, government and privately funded toll roads have played vital roles in partially filling the gap created by depleted roadway tax funds. These toll roads have dramatically improved the quality of life for hundreds of thousands of people. Citizens have voiced their acceptance by acquiring toll tags for more than 50% of the registered vehicles residing in toll road served areas.
It would seem ill-advised to prohibit foreign investments from supporting needed mobility improvements if this is the most cost-effective alternative available and U.S. firms choose to not bid, or, are not competitive. If sound contracts are constructed to protect US toll road users, competent companies headquartered in many foreign countries are acceptable to provide the needed capital investment. The foreign firm leases the land or the right to operate the toll road but does not own a single square foot of the American roadway. For many years, the US was a dominant provider of foreign infrastructure in major industries throughout the world. Boeing is the top US exporter and maintains a major share of the world commercial aircraft market. Should foreign customers have rejected the US?
We urge you to assure campaign statements regarding mobility are accurate and that they support mobility improvements which are so vital to all citizens.
Sincerely,
Gerald Daugherty Jim Skaggs
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TxDOT mulls way to wire around toll lease ban
Interesting article today in the Bond Buyer about how the Texas Department of Transportation might contrive to use private money to build toll lanes in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. Thanks to an alert reader who told me about the story.
Under one scenario, under consideration for doubling the six lanes of Interstate 35 as it passes through Dallas, a private developer would front the $4.3 billion for the project (including more than $650 million just for right of way along the heavily developed highway) and then be paid back through the department’s pass-through toll program. But with a difference.
Under normal pass-through agreements — the state has many such deals with local governments that have led to completed road projects, and others approved — a city or county fronts the money for expanding a state highway. Then, over 10 or 20 years, TxDOT pays back about 80 percent of the money using gas tax revenue. Such projects typically are on free-to-drive roads that remain so after the work is done.
Obviously, that wouldn’t work in this case because paying back almost $4 billion over 10 years would take a huge bite out of what are already insufficient gas tax funds for TxDOT. Instead, the private developer would be paid back out of toll revenue, perhaps backed by general TxDOT revenue if tolls fell short of making the payments. The plan is add two free lanes to I-35 in Dallas, and four toll lanes.
TxDOT, spokesman Chris Lippincott said, would have to rewrite the current rules of the pass-through toll program to make this possible. But the department believes that state law, despite the expiration last September of authority to do all but a handful of private toll road leases, would allow this sort of pass-through toll agreement with the private sector.
As for putting tolls on an interstate, Interstate 10 in western Harris County already had toll lanes added to existing free lanes in the decade just ended, and there’s a project ongoing to add them on Interstate 20 in Fort Worth. In addition, TxDOT has signed an agreement with a private consortium led by Spanish toll road builder Cintra to add toll lanes to Interstate 635 in Dallas.
TxDOT can’t simply convert free interstate lanes to toll lanes — state law requires a public vote for conversions, and federal law may not allow it at all — but it can toll expanded capacity on an interstate.
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Recommended Nueces bike plan not likely until April
The specifics of how the City of Austin would put Nueces Street on a “traffic diet” likely won’t emerge until April, city bicycle coordinator Annick Beaudet said this afternoon. And the plan, although it is not technically required, will come back before the Austin City Council for review before anything is done, city officials said.
The next thing to happen: Release Feb. 24 of a traffic analysis commissioned by the city. This will occur at the third of three public forums on the proposal to make Nueces Street a “bicycle boulevard” from Third Street to MLK Jr. Boulevard. The forum will be at 6 p.m. at Pease Elementary at the corner of 12th and Rio Grande streets.
A bicycle boulevard could take on any number of forms, from a bikes-only street to one that retains full flow of traffic but adds bicycle lanes. No one from the city is suggesting a bikes-only approach for Nueces. And in fact, because fire trucks and ambulances from a station at Nueces and MLK use the street to get downtown in emergencies, one requirement is that southbound traffic have no impediments at all.
But various other strategies in the works, such as so-called “partial diverters” that prevent turns onto a lane of Nueces, could restrict northbound traffic.
The Nueces concept was included in a 540-page master bicycle plan for the city approved by the council last summer, but most landowners along the street were not aware of it until November when the city sent out notices of the public forums. Many of the landowners have mobilized against the idea, arguing that that traffic diet (cutting traffic by as much as two-thirds) would put their business receipts on a diet as well.
Bicycle advocates and city officials, meanwhile, counter with the idea that creating a unique haven for cyclists (there are none like it currently in Texas) would instead increase property values. Those opposing views provided the only tense moment today at what was otherwise a courtly hearing before the Austin City Council’s Comprehensive Planning and Transportation Committee.
Commercial real estate broker Susan Harris, who offices at 18th and Nueces and opposes the bicycle boulevard (at least in its more extreme forms), said that decreasing traffic would have a negative impact on coming plans to build high-density, several-story office or residential buildings on what is now a street of low-rise offices and old homes converted to business use.
Council Member Chris Riley, who commutes by bicycle and supports the bike boulevard concept, asked Harris if under that logic she would have opposed the narrowing of Second Street between Congress Avenue and San Antonio, a project that preceded construction of several residential buildings there. Harris, who noted that she is a recreational cyclist and that her daughter is an officer in a cycling club at her high school, began a discussion of her position. But Riley cut her off and asked for a yes or no answer.
Yes, Harris said, she would have opposed the narrowing of Second.
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Cap Metro details final steps to rail opening
The long and winding road that has been Capital Metro’s commuter rail project is in its last stages, increasingly confident agency officials said today, including work to complete late-in-the-game changes in the line’s signal and communication systems.
The 32-mile line from Leander to downtown Austin should be “operational” by late February, interim chief executive officer Doug Allen said, allowing federal railroad regulators to come in and give it a final once-over. Assuming the line passes that test, then agency rail contractor Herzog Transit Services will do about two weeks of on-schedule testing and the line would open before April. That would meet the first-quarter 2010 target for opening Capital Metro set last fall.
“I don’t lose any sleep over this,” said Elaine Timbes, Capital Metro’s executive vice president. “I’m just excited to be a part of it. I’ve been here 24 years. To be part of launching rail for this community, it’s an opportunity of a lifetime for me.”
Allen and Timbes stopped just short of guaranteeing a March opening, given that installation of new software in the line’s signal system is ongoing and will have to be tested. The agency decided last fall decided to reprogram the system of red, yellow and green lights that will tell train engineers when they can go and when they must stop, going from a system that had different modes for passenger trains and for freight trains to a single mode of signals. Cost: $530,000.
And the agency likewise is installing a radio-wave communication system along the line, including relay equipment on poles along the line. The agency had originally planned to use a cellular system for to relay data from the track signal installations to the central control system in North Austin, but decided last fall instead to use radio frequencies as a primary system with the cellular system as a backup.
The agency and Herzog are also engaged in an intersection-by-intersection final inspection and repair of the crossing arm equipment that had performed erratically throughout last year during train testing. Capital Metro also is “de-stressing” some track sections that because of installation problems had developed subtle waves that could cause discomfort to passengers.
Capital Metro, which had originally said construction and startup of the rail line would cost $90 million and be done by early 2008, since early last year has put the final cost at about $105 million. But that does not include a variety of expenditures directly related to the rail line, including a $7.4 million park-and-ride lot at the Leander station. Nor does it include any of the $35 million or so that will have been paid by the time rail opens to Veolia Transportation, the agency’s former rail operator fired in December, and to Herzog as they helped the agency get the line ready for service.
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Gilbert Tweed to search for new Cap Metro leader
The Capital Metro board this afternoon voted to hire Gilbert Tweed International, at a cost of $175,900, to help it find a new chief executive officer for the transit agency.
Gilbert Tweed president Stephanie Pinson was Capital Metro’s search consultant in 1998 when the agency hired Karen Rae as Capital Metro chief. Rae served for four years.
The 38-year-old, woman-owned executive search firm, based in New York, prevailed over three other finalists.
Gilbert Tweed will help the board refine what it is looking for in a leader, recruit and screen candidates, manage the interviews with finalists and shepherd a process to let the public have its say, and help the board make a final decision. The Capital Metro staff set out a best-case schedule that could have the board making a decision by late April.
But board chairman Mike Martinez, elected to that post earlier in today’s meeting, cautioned about rushing the search.
“For me, it’s not about whether it takes six days or six months,” Martinez said. “It’s about we hire the best leader for Capital Metro.”
That could include someone from outside the transit industry, Martinez said, asking if it was made clear to Gilbert Tweed that the search should not be confined to transit insiders. Human Resources director Donna Simmons assured him that was the case.
Fred Gilliam, who had been the agency’s leader since the spring of 2002, retired in October after a stormy last several years on the job. Doug Allen, who came to the agency in 2008 as the agency’s second in command, has been interim chief executive officer since Gilliam departed.
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Martinez elected Cap Metro board chairman
A unanimous Capital Metro board has just elected Austin City Council Member Mike Martinez chairman of the board.
Austin City Council Member Chris Riley had been serving as interim chairman since a reconstituted board took over Jan. 6.
“There’s a better day coming for Capital Metro,” Martinez said after being elected 8-0. “I don’t plan on being here long. I don’t plan on staying in this position 10, 15 years. My goal is to get this agency to where we all want it to be” and then step down.
Martinez has served on the board since June 2007.
Transportation and land use consultant John Langmore, who joined the transit board this month, was named vice chairman. And Beverly Silas, a consultant who formerly headed the Envision Central Texas planning organization, was elected secretary.
The board, drawing lots from a shiny blue mylar bag, then decided who among them will serve until June 2011, June 2012 and June 2013. The board, given that they are in effect a new body, had to pick different ending service dates to set up a system of staggered terms.
Board members Norm Chafetz and Langmore’s terms will end June 1, 2011. Members John Cowman, Frank Fernandez and Silas’ terms end June 1, 2012. And Martinez, Riley and Anne Stafford have terms ending June 1, 2013.
Members could serve a second term lasting three years if the bodies that appointed them to the transit board chooses to reappoint them.
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April now likely for Ben White/I-35 project start
Carlos Lopez, Austin district engineer for TxDOT, says the winning bidder for the Ben White Boulevard/Interstate 35 flyover project should be selected in early February, with construction starting sometime in April.
This is about six months beyond when the project was predicted to start at one time. But then it had to be re-bid. The winning bidder the first time around, McCarthy Brothers, had said it would do the job for $24.4 million, almost $3 million below the next lowest bid. But McCarthy said it had made that bid in error and withdrew from the project late last year.
So TxDOT had to start over.
The project involves building four more flyovers connecting I-35 to Ben White/Texas 71, those on the south side of the interchange. When a major reworking of that junction was done earlier this decade, TxDOT only had enough money at the time to do the four flyovers on the north side of the interchange. People who live or work south of there ever since have been frustrated at still having to exit and go through traffic lights to make the turn.
That should be a thing of the past by some time in mid- to late 2011.
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Rail: Maybe this time?
Capital Metro, in a letter Thursday to the Federal Railroad Administration, said it will make simulated runs on its MetroRail passenger line in early March and “open the line later in March.”
However, the letter to the federal agency’s regional administrator Bonnie J. Murphy from Capital Metro interim chief executive officer Doug Allen also says work on its signals and crossings remains to be completed. The performance of those signals and crossings has been the major hangup over the past year as the transit agency has worked to get the long-delayed line started.
Significantly, Capital Metro, which had said last fall it would open the line in the first quarter of this year, is still not yet ready to name a specific date for the opening.
The agency, during the runup to a November 2004 referendum authorizing it to build the line from Leander to downtown Austin, had said service would begin in “early 2008.” Over time, that target opening date moved to summer 2008, fall 2008 and then March 30 of last year.
But in mid-March, with the signal and crossing problems becoming obvious and work ongoing on two stations and siding tracks, the opening was put on indefinite hold. The agency then spent the balance of the year working on crossing equipment, which in many cases were not opening and closing as intended, and on the signal system, which the Federal Railroad Administration said had “vital logic” problems.
The agency and its former railroad contractor, Veolia Transportation, performed a “hazard analysis/risk assessment” on the system last summer and fall, and began the process of addressing remaining issues.
Veolia was fired December 9 and replaced by Herzog Transit Services as operator of the passenger line. Watco, which had been a subcontractor for Veolia and was running the agency’s freight rail operation, is still doing that job but is now directly working for Capital Metro.
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Meeting tonight on Nueces ‘bicycle boulevard’ project
The City of Austin will hold a second public meeting this evening on its plans to turn Nueces Street downtown into a “bicycle boulevard.”
The meeting will take place from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. at Pease Elementary School, 1106 Rio Grande Street.
There will be an additional meeting Feb. 24 at the same time and place, where city staff members will present the results of a traffic analysis of Nueces.
The bicycle boulevard concept was part of the Austin Bicycle Master Plan, approved by the city council last summer. But details are still being worked out, and opposition has surfaced from some property owners along the street.
Advocates for the boulevard say that cyclists in effect need a road to call their own downtown. Nueces, which gently slopes toward the river from MLK Jr. Boulevard to Third Street (where it dead ends into the remains of the Green Water Treatment Plant), would be ideal for this, they say, because traffic is relatively light and because of its lack of hills.
Under the plan, devices to block or slow car traffic would be installed on Nueces between Third and MLK. That might include “bollards,” metal posts spaced a few feet apart that could be planted in the asphalt every few blocks. That way, cars could access every property, but wouldn’t be able to make a through trip on Nueces. Also under consideration: other traffic calming devices such as speed humps or “pinch points,” spots where the road would narrow to one lane.
In addition, cyclists would like to remove many of the north-south stop signs in that stretch, allowing them to move for several blocks without stopping.
The street is dominated by older homes converted into offices for lawyers and bail bondsmen. But the Blackwell/Thurman Criminal Justice Center is on the street between 10th and 11th streets, and the Regency Apartments also are on Nueces. In addition, there are restaurants at Sixth Street, and a city fire station at MLK that often disgorges firetrucks onto Nueces for calls.
Scott Sayers, who has offices in a building on Nueces near MLK, says that the proposed changes would inevitably cut business for property owners along the street, and that the plan is too intrusive for the relatively small slice of traffic on bicycles.
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Police warn of I-35 northbound standstill in Temple
Northbound Interstate 35 in Temple is a mess this afternoon, the Temple Police Department reports. Avoid that area north of Austin if you can.
Say the Temple police:
Northbound Interstate 35 in Temple is at a virtual standstill from the north city limits to the 299 mile marker (South Loop 363 overpass). Motorists are advised to avoid this stretch of northbound highway and use alternate routes for the remainder of the afternoon and evening, if at all possible. The heavy delays are the result of a restricted flow of traffic due to a highway re-paving project, north of the city limits near Troy.
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Fired Cap Metro contractor lays off 67 workers
Veolia Transportation Co., the operations contractor that Capital Metro recently fired, has laid off 67 workers in Austin, according to the Texas Workforce Commission.
The job cuts were effective Friday, the company told the Workforce Commission.
However, Herzog Transit Services, one of the contractors hired to replace Veolia, has offered jobs to 55 of those workers.
CapMetro fired Veolia earlier this month, canceling a five-year, $112 million contract for freight and passenger operations.
Herzog won a no-bid contract to operate the as-yet-finished passenger rail line that will run between Leander and downtown Austin. The transit agency has said the change will not affect the new launch date, sometime during the first quarter next year.
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Holiday travel tips, courtesy of your local airport
The folks at Austin-Bergstrom International Airport, about to host a whole lot of people heading out of town, have some advice for you. Here, verbatim as written by the city, is a new release they put out this afternoon with tips for travelers:
AUSTIN, TEXAS - Austin-Bergstrom International Airport is decked out for the holidays and ready for travelers. As the holidays attract more passengers than the average day, holiday travelers should plan to arrive at least 90 minutes before their scheduled departure times
Travel is expected to be heaviest on Dec. 23, 2009. Additionally, Dec. 18, 21, 22 and 27 are expected to be busier than average days.
Getting through the airport is smoother for travelers who come prepared. The following is recommended:
While packing, check luggage to ensure no prohibited items are in the bag or its pockets. Before leaving for the airport, check flight status with airline or the airport’s Web site, www.abia.org, and click on the “flight status, real-time” icon. Plan to arrive at least 90 minutes before your departure time. Allow ample time to get to the airport. Traffic and weather conditions could add to commute time. Be prepared to present a government ID. Park easy. Zip in, zoom out with ABIA On Airport Parking: - Use credit card express lanes. Just swipe a credit card on the way in and swipe the same card on the way out. There’s no parking stub to keep track of and in just a swipe of a card you’re on your way. Call ahead for ABIA On Airport Parking updates, 512-530-3300. Be prepared for security screening, dress smart and pack smart: o Do not wrap gifts as they may have to be opened during security inspections
o Remember 3-1-1 for liquids, gels and aerosols in carry-on luggage. Three ounces per container, in a clear, one-quart bag, one per passenger. These bags should be placed in bins going through x-ray like other personal belongings such as keys. This will speed up the process as TSA will not have to search through carry-ons for liquids.
o Knives, scissors with pointed tips, pepper spray and other such items are prohibited as carry-on items. For a comprehensive list of banned and permitted items in carry-on baggage, visit the TSA’s Web site at www.tsa.gov.
o Carry-on luggage is restricted to one bag and one personal item such as a laptop, purse, backpack, or briefcase. A laptop must be removed from its case to go through x-ray machines
o Avoid wearing jewelry and accessories that contain metal. Consider wearing shoes that can be easily removed as they must pass through x-ray machines.
o Outer coats, jackets and other such garments must be put through x-ray screening.
Picking up friends or family at the airport? Don’t circle the terminal road and waste gas, park in the ABIA Parking Garage, where parking less than 30 minutes is free. Afterwards there is an hourly parking fee structure (0-30 minutes is free; 31-60 minutes is $2; each additional hour is $2, up to a daily maximum of $18.48 plus tax). Meeters and greeters should also know their arriving passenger’s airline, place of origin, and arrival time.
For airport information 24 hours a day, call (512) 530-ABIA (2242) or visit www.abia.org.
Austin-Bergstrom International Airport ranked in the top three for customer service among airports its size around the globe and third for any size in North America in the Airports Council International (ACI) Airport Service Quality Survey. Austin-Bergstrom has nonstop service to 36 destinations in the U.S. and served over 9 million passengers in 2008. A complete listing of all nonstop flight destinations from Austin and the airlines that serve them is available on www.abia.org, click on ‘airlines & flights.’
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Riverside/Texas 71 underpass project approved
The Texas Transportation Commission this morning unanimously approved spending $42.9 million to extend the Texas 71 freeway past Riverside Drive.
The project, not likely to begin construction until fall 2011 because of remaining design and environmental clearance work, would include a Texas 71 underpass under Riverside Drive at the intersection and extension of Texas 71’s frontage roads to east of Riverside.
In conjunction with an expected elimination of a stoplight on Texas 71 at Thornberry Road, drivers by mid-2013 would be able to go from Interstate 35 east on Ben White Road (Texas 71) all the way to Austin-Bergstrom International Airport without encountering a traffic light.
The money for the project will come from Proposition 14 funds, so named for the 2003 amendment to the Texas Constitution that allowed the Texas Department of Transportation to sell bonds and pay them back with future gas taxes. TxDOT, because contracting prices have been falling well below engineering estimates, had money left over from an earlier list of Proposition 14 projects and was able to do this project and another in Midland.
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Stafford named to new Capital Metro board
The Austin City Council today named Ann Stafford, manager of corporate and foundation relations for Texas Performing Arts, as its second appointee to the Capital Metro board. That leaves only the appointee from the Travis County Commissioners Court to complete what will now be an eight-member transit board.
Stafford, 55, got her bachelor’s degree in journalism from Auburn University in Alabama, and has lived in the Austin area for 30 years. She worked at high-tech manufacturer AMD, and then its spinoff Spansion for nine years until she left in August for Texas Performing Arts, which among other things runs Bass Concert Hall at the University of Texas.
Stafford, a board member of Envision Central Texas and the founder of Austin Public Library Foundation, does grant writing and fundraising in her current position.
The Capital Metro board this fall has been undergoing a makeover mandated by a state law, authored by state Sen. Kirk Watson, D-Austin, that passed this spring. The change came in the wake of several years of labor troubles at the agency, delays in getting the agency’s passenger line open and deepening financial difficulties.
The current board has seven members, five of them elected officials and two appointed by the Capital Area Metropolitan Planning Organization board. The new board, which takes office Jan. 1, will have eight members: three appointed by CAMPO, including one elected official; one by mayors of small cities in the Capital Metro area; one each by the Travis County commissioners and Williamson County commissioners; and two by the Austin City Council.
The new board so far:
From CAMPO: transportation and land use consultant John Langmore, housing non-profit executive Frank Fernandez, and Austin City Council Member Mike Martinez.
From the small cities: Leander Mayor John Cowman.
From Williamson County: consultant Norm Chafetz
From the City of Austin: Austin City Council Member Chris Riley and Stafford.
The Travis County Commissioners Court interviewed three finalists Tuesday and is expected to make its choice Dec. 22.
Martinez, Cowman and Riley are on the current Capital Metro board.
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Cap Metro no-bid contracts are illegal, fired contractor charges
Capital Metro illegally awarded no-bid contracts last week to two companies to run its rail operations, fired rail contractor, Veolia Transportation, claims in an official protest filed today with the transit agency.
Federal law prohibits a transit agency from awarding contracts without taking bids “absent certain limited exceptions,” Veolia says in the four-page “protest of sole-source awards” letter. The exception for emergencies, Veolia argues, does not apply to situations in which the need for a new contractor was created by releasing an existing contractor willing and able to do the work.
Veolia also revealed that Capital Metro since March had not paid a $45,000 monthly management fee to Veolia, whose contract with the agency began in October 2007. The agency had originally agreed to pay that monthly fee to Veolia (in addition to covering Veolia’s direct expenses such as employee salaries and benefits) during the period before rail service opens. When the starting date was pushed from fall 2008 to March 30, 2009, the two sides amended their agreement to extend that fee to March.
They had been in negotiations to extend that fee again, along with other issues, when the firing occurred last week.
The Capital Metro board, acting on a recommendation from agency executives, Wednesday voted 5-0 to terminate Veolia’s five-year, $112 million contract to run both freight and passenger rail operations on the agency’s tracks. The board awarded no-bid contracts of $61 million to Herzog Transit Services to run the as-yet-unopened passenger line from Leander to downtown Austin for five years, and $33.9 million to Watco Companies Inc. to run the freight rail operation for five years and nine months.
Watco had already been running the freight operation, which principally carries quarried rock from near Marble Falls to Austin, as a subcontractor to Veolia.
Capital Metro officials, who had been quietly talking to Herzog, Watco and at least one other company for two weeks before the sudden move, justified the firing and quick contracts (some of the largest in the agency’s 24-year history) on the grounds that continuing with Veolia “would have exposed the Authority and the community to additional costs and risks.”
Capital Metro and Veolia had been in negotiations since early November over various issues, including liability insurance. Veolia, saying that its contract required it to insure Capital Metro only for actions taken by Veolia, on Nov. 10 decided unilaterally to amend an insurance policy that insured Capital Metro for damages arising from the transit agency’s actions. In addition, Capital Metro said Veolia had issued a “take-it-or-leave-it” demand for other contract amendments that would have cost the agency an additonal $7.4 million over the next five years.
The agency cited both the insurance and cost issues in the firing and the emergency contracting with the other two companies. Herzog, Capital Metro officials said, has purchased a $100 million liability policy that covers the agency for all damages arising from the rail line. And the agency will pay $10.7 million less to Herzog over the next five years than it would have paid to Veolia under what the company was asking in the negotiations, Capital Metro said.
But “the issues raised by Capital Metro,” Veolia charges in its letter today, “have been greatly exaggerated for the purpose of diverting attention from the backroom nature of the actions taken. The history of our relationship with Capital Metro unfortunately is replete with attempts to use Veolia as a scapegoat for failures of Capital Metro and its other contractors.”
“None of the limited exceptions apply to this situation,” says the letter from Ron Hartman, chief executive officer of Veolia’s rail division. “In particular, the exception for public exigency or emergency does not apply to an exigency or purported emergency created by the Authority itself, or, put another way, it does not allow the Authority to ‘bootstrap’ the argument that, after terminating for convenience a ready, willing and able contractor performing as required under the contract, it now lacks a contractor to perform the work.”
Voters approved the 32-mile passenger line from Leander to downtown Austin, now called the MetroRail Red Line, in November 2004. At the time, the agency said the line would open in “early 2008” and cost $90 million. The agency delayed the opening several times, and now says it will open in the first quarter next year. Veolia, in its letter, said Capital Metro had internally set a new target date of March 1. The cost meanwhile has risen to $105 million, but that does not included millions of dollars for items directly related to passenger rail that the agency ascribes to other parts of its operations.
If that March 1 opening date is missed, the letter says, “it will have nothing to do with Veolia …”
Veolia’s letter said the company will seek reimbursement for the “substantial investments” the company has made on Capital Metro’s line.
Capital Metro spokesman Adam Shaivitz, asked for the agency’s reaction to the protest letter, said this morning that the agency had forwarded the letter to Capital Metro lawyers for review.
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I hope no one else was killed, but as I have heard they are missing one worker and let’s hope he went home or was late for work.
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i hope he schools the board on the concept of fare elasticity.
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