Defer action on Route 28 project due to flawed process

The Northern Virginia Transportation Authority is scheduled to approve a project agreement that will advance Alignment 2B for a Route 28 Bypass at their meeting on October 8.

“Our coalition of conservation, smart growth, and transportation reform groups is calling on the NVTA to delay action because of the negative environmental, regional travel, and community impacts of the proposed Alignment 2B and because of significant procedural failings that must be addressed,” said Stewart Schwartz, Executive Director of the Coalition for Smarter Growth.

Rick Holt, Chair of Active Prince William noted that “State law, Section 15.2-2232, requires that new roads be consistent with local comprehensive plans and that local planning commissions make a finding to that effect. However, Alignment 2B of Route 28, which the Prince William Board of Supervisors approved in a controversial 5 to 3 vote, is not in the Comprehensive Plan for either Fairfax County or Prince William County and has not been reviewed and approved by their planning commissions.”

“The entire Route 28 study process has been flawed and frustrating sound alternatives analysis and community input,” said Charlie Grymes, former chair of the Prince William Conservation Alliance.

• The 50+ families who would be displaced from a rare spot of affordable housing were not provided adequate notification and an opportunity to respond.
• The promised federal Environmental Study and Alternatives Analysis (originally proposed as an Environmental Impact Statement) was never completed and was prematurely abandoned, so the pros and cons of the alternatives were never adequately documented, much less presented for public review and comment.
• The critical Purpose and Need Statement for the Route 28 Environmental Study was never disclosed to the public prior to an October 9, 2019, public meeting.  Not only was the Purpose of Need Statement never released for public comment, but it also was evidently never released for review and comment by relevant local, state, or federal agencies.
• No public hearings were ever held for this project prior to July 14, 2020, public hearing before the Prince William Board of County Supervisors to proceed with the preliminary engineering for Alignment 2B.
• None of the written reports for the Route 28 Environmental Study, including the Traffic Technical Report, were posted for public review prior to July 7, 2020, only one week prior to the July 14, 2020, public hearing.  These reports and their findings were never discussed at any prior public meetings for this project.
• Despite the Fairfax County location of “Option 2B,” the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors has held no public hearing on either amending the adopted Comprehensive Plan or approving the proposed route for the new Route 28 bypass “Option 2B” through Fairfax County.
• The May 2019 Traffic Technical Report from the Environmental Study shows Alignment 2B would produce the most failing intersections of the four alternatives studied.  Furthermore, compared to the No-Build Alternative in 2040, building the Bypass would increase traffic volumes on Route 28 in Fairfax County on the north side of the Bypass by as much as 26%.
• Study findings showed that the “least environmentally damaging practicable alternative” that meets the purpose and need is Alignment 4 along the existing Route 28 north of Manassas, and the Prince William Board of County Supervisors voted 8 to 0 on August 4 to adopt this alternative
• In an unusual in-person presentation by the Chair and Executive Director of the Northern Virginia Transportation Authority on September 8, the Prince William supervisors were warned that NVTA would revoke the planned $89 million for the Route 28 project unless Alignment 2B was chosen, and funding might be allocated instead to projects in Loudoun County or other jurisdictions
• The Prince William Board then held a second vote, switching to Alternative 2B on a 5 to 3 vote, without allowing additional public testimony.
• Informed advocates repeatedly offered an improved version of Alternative 4, along an extension of Well Street through Yorkshire, that would minimize impacts on Route 28 businesses, greatly lower project costs, and could create dedicated bus/HOV lanes and a network of street connections to support economic revitalization. This concept would also create the potential for Route 28 bus rapid transit, but county staff refused to consider this alternative while pressing their preference for Alternative 2B

“Alignment 2B would displace over 50 families from their homes. It would add noise and pollution to “equity emphasis” neighborhoods and plow through the floodplain/wetlands of Flat Branch, which feeds into Bull Run and the Occoquan Reservoir, a critical drinking water supply,” said Grymes. “Alignment 2B would fuel more sprawling development and traffic coming from as far away as Fauquier and Culpeper, rather than address existing traffic coming from central Prince William via Liberia Avenue.”