Posted on 07/26/2011 9:41:02 PM PDT by Bean Counter
Washington, Oregon, federal government struggle to determine how to pay for project
(Vancouver, WA) Knock aside the steel beams and concrete, and there’s just one thing that the Columbia River Crossing will be built upon: money.
And one of the largest public works projects in the Pacific Northwest has an unusual plan to get that money — one that relies on the federal government, two states and local tolls to pay the estimated $2.63 billion to $3.76 billion price tag.
The CRC is coming of age in an era where paying for big infrastructure projects is growing increasingly difficult, so having a diversified portfolio works in the project’s favor, Director Nancy Boyd said. Not one partner — the states, the feds or the commuters — could pay for this by themselves, she said.
“With the current state of the economy, trying to finance a project of this magnitude in any of those realms alone couldn’t be done,” Boyd said. “In my mind, you have to have all three.”
*SNIP*
Last week Oregon State Treasurer Ted Wheeler, citing faulty and inflated traffic projections, blew a $598 million hole in the project’s assumptions about how much it can earn via tolls. Pre-completion tolling starting in 2014 and federal loans are now likely part of the plan.
*SNIP*
A common theme runs through the way Oregon and Washington lawmakers talk about how they’re going to find $450 million each to pay for the CRC — a lot of hope, but not a lot of solid plans.
They’re not sure where the money’s coming from.
**SCHNIPP**
No $hi*, Skippy! Nobody else does either!
The chances of this project receiving any "Federal Funding" is directly dependent upon the Democrats forcing a sufficient enough hike in the debt ceiling, so that Senator Patty Murray can write the project just under a $1 Billion check, using money that will supposedly be borrowed from the Communist Chinese.
(That is, if the ChiComms are stupid enough to lend the US another dime...)
But the problem is that there isn't even a design on paper yet, so the project is attempting to come up with something to fit the budget that local politicos and WSDOT promised they would not exceed. The potential for cost over-runs is staggering, and there is virtually no support locally to pay nearly $1500 a year in tolls, along with a hike in the local Sales Tax in order to pay for maintenance and operation of the Loot Rail line. Given the way Washington State's finances are structured, if the Loot Rail line is losing money and tolls can't pay the bills, then the next option is a special lien on private property owners.
Make no mistake, the Columbia River Crossing Project is the "Big Dig" of the Pacifist Northwest. It is multi-billions of dollars devoted to Loot Rail, Bicycle and Pedestrian access to Interstate 5, and all of it based on budgetary projections that are straight out of Fantasy Land.
(For the uninitiated, Boston's "Big Dig" was projected to cost just $2 Billion in 1987, and ended up running over $14.7 Billion by the time the project ended in 2003.)
Worth a read at the link...search keywords for background reading.....
That is the way the title was published...not my error...
but they still want an HOV and a light rail lane on the bridge.
Just as long as the charge bikes and train passengers their fair share of the additional costs...so a bike toll should be about $2000 each way. If that results in no riders..then they don’t need the bike trail..right?
How about they just continue to repaint the existing bridge (you know, like what they’ve done with the Golden Gate Bridge for almost 100 years)? Oh, sorry, they need carpool lanes and light rail.
Now, if we were $14T in debt, I might oppose it - but since our finances are so great, why not spend a few billion here?
Screw’em!
Put in a ferry downriver to tie Interstate 5 (eastside of the Columbia River) in with US30 Hwy (westside of the Columbia River).
It would be a lot cheaper and take some of the traffic off the main bridge at Jantzen Beach.
There already exists a rail line just downriver a bit from the main bridge; that could be used by light rail.
The problem is these people don’t think creatively, you know, out-of-the-box; they all think like apparatchiks, old-style Soviet Socialists with 5-year plans and no commonsense!
Why not put a dam there and drive across the top? The upstream flooding would eliminate a lot of the current north Portland problems.
You know, there is a bridge already across the river at Long View.
You have long view on one side of the river and almost nothing on the other side. Maybe they should just beef up that bridge and eliminate the I5 Bridge entirely. After all, we still have the other bridge by the airport over the river.
They should divert I5 up 30 and call it good, we don’t have the money for all this duplication anymore.
It wasn't always so, although to us youngsters it just seems that way.
Randal O'Toole's take is honest and refreshing: Henry J. Is Spinning in His Grave.
My mother, who spent three years there (in Vancouver, not Portland) as a newly-wed while my dad was in the Army, always spoke highly of Kaiser and his shipbuilding efforts. Nobody did it better.
I live in Longview. It is nearly a 40 mile drive between Rainier and Columbia City, all two lane with a lot of drunks out driving. Not a thing to consider unless you have to drive that stretch and besides, it seems the Mexican drug smugglers dump dead bodies in the countryside along in there.
What I’m thinking of is a ferry from Woodland, WA, over to Columbia City/Saint Helens, OR.
Traffic going to Hillsboro, Beaverton, or points south of Tigard could take the ferry and completely bypass Portland. The folks in Cornelius Pass won’t like it, but it would probably be cheaper to run four lanes through there than to build a big, honkin’ bridge!
Oh no you don't! Seattle's Viaduct replacement tunnel gets to be the "Big Dig" of the NW. It's projected to cost $4 billion, will take the 3 lane Highway 99 (the main detour around downtown Seattle) down to 2 lanes (yes, we LOSE capacity), and will easily eclipse $15 billion by the time it's done.
You can claim the CRC is the NW's bridge to nowhere, but when it comes to frivolous, wasteful transportation spending - Seattle (with it's $200+ million per mile light rail with 2000 daily riders) is number one in the NW!
Still cant pump your own gas down there? Been a while since I was in that neck of the woods...
These creatures have destroyed my home State completely. They have no understanding that trees are an agricultural crop that grow back. And what really gets me, most of the support for the tree-hugger organizations comes from New York City and other metro areas where they have never seen (or will ever see) a real tree. But they want to protect them because it looks cool in the brochure.
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