NVTA was supposed to fund road projects that relieve the most congestion

Opinion 

The Northern Virginia Transportation Authority, which is charged with allocating some $351 million in locally raised state taxes for 2015-16, held a meeting March 25, to receive public input into the projects they propose to fund.  

The Virginia law governing the selection of eligible projects provides that the Northern Virginia Transportation “… Authority shall give priority to selecting projects that are expected to provide the greatest congestion reduction relative to the cost of the project and shall document this information for each project selected.”

Myself, Delegate Albo, and Delegate LeMunyon offered in-person testimony before the NVTA.   We questioned how the NVTA arrived at the final proposed project list when it clearly did not propose to fund only those road projects that VDOT had identified as providing the greatest congestion reduction for the tax dollars spent.   Some projects were omitted that provided up to 20 times the congestion relief per dollar spent over projects that were chosen!   

In my testimony I additionally asked how any money could be spent on transit projects when no data was presented at all to indicate the cost benefit analysis for such expenditures in light of the requirement of the law to document congestion relief for each project selected.  The NVTA has allocated $139 million for 17 transit projects and two transit planning studies.

Again, the NVTA Board clearly is not following this provision of the law because they are selecting lower priority congestion reduction projects  for funding over more efficient congestion reduction projects.  Further, the  NVTA has offered NO objective measures at all to document the cost/benefit congestion reductions for even one of their proposed 17 transit projects.   

I also raised the question of Rt. 28 corridor improvements from Manassas to I-66 at the meeting last night.  

I did thank the NVTA for agreeing to fund a $2.5 million study to examine alternatives for the improvement of the Manassas to Centreville Rt. 28 corridor.   This study will look at widening 28 to six lanes (three north and three south) from Manassas to Centreville, widening Old Centreville Road to three lanes on existing right of way using two and one reversible lanes for the morning and evening commute from Manassas to Fairfax at Compton Rd., and  look at the previously designated Tri-county bypass (not to be confused with the Bi-county parkway which I oppose) from Godwin Drive at Rt. 234 Business near Manassas Mall to Rt. I-66.  

This $2.5 million study had been discussed at meetings of the Route 28 Corridor Steering Committee, which I serve on as a working member.  Several NVTA members are also on the Route 28 Committee.   There is unanimous agreement that with 60,000 cars per weekday, with traffic crawling at an average of 9 MPH in the morning commute, the road is way beyond its capacity, and will only get worse with the current construction of 1,300+ more housing units near the Fairfax border, and other building projects that would feed onto already overburdened Route 28.

The NVTA is proposing to allocate $5 million out of a $45 million cost for widening Rt. 28 from the Prince William Line to Centreville to six lanes.  However, the NVTA did not suggest a short term solution of reversible lanes for Rt. 28 from Manassas to the Fairfax Count line.   Fairfax Supervisors have already placed widening Rt. 28 from Compton Road to Centreville on their Six Year Plan.  

To date, Prince William Supervisors have not added this portion of Rt. 28 to their Six Year Plan, nor designated Rt. 28 to reconfigure existing lane usage to three and two reversible lanes for morning and evening commutes to provide some relief in the short run.  VDOT told me the lane redesignation would cost roughly $6 million.

During the regular General Assembly session I did offer an amendment to the Budget to improve Route 28 from Manassas to the PW line but the Appropriations Committee did not include the amendment, nor were similar amendments offered by other delegates passed.  

I will continue to work to improve Route 28, one of the most dangerous, most congested roads in Northern Virginia.  In addition I support the NVTA proposed study to increase parking capacity at the Manassas Park VRE station

This post was submitted by Virginia Delegate Bob Marshall who serves western Prince William County and Manassas Park.