By BRUCE TOMASO - The Dallas Morning News - Saturday, November 3, 2007
The question comes up often at debates about the Trinity toll road:
What about mass transit?
In fact, Dallas Area Rapid Transit is doing precisely that. By 2030, the agency plans to double its light-rail mileage and ridership. Included in those plans are a new Green Line and its offshoot Orange Line that will, in places, roughly parallel the route of the Trinity toll road.
But transportation planners caution that neither those added rail lines nor other mass-transit improvements in the works – such as greatly increased use of HOV lanes – can, by themselves, address the region's growing traffic problems.
"Any kind of solution that we implement to fix traffic congestion in downtown Dallas has to be done with multiple modes," said Jeff Neal, principal transportation planner for the North Central Texas Council of Governments.
"We can't do it just with rail, and we can't do it just with road construction, and we can't do it just by improving bicycle and pedestrian access. We have to use all of the tools at our disposal."
He said that in determining the need for the Trinity Parkway, as the toll road is officially named, regional planners factored in all of the improvements that DART plans to make – every mile of rail that will be built between now and 2030.
And even taking those into account, he said, "we still end up with 110,000 cars a day on the Trinity Parkway."
That figure is the high estimate for what the toll road would carry.
By comparison, DART's total existing rail system, stretching from Plano and Garland to South Dallas and west Oak Cliff, carries about 60,000 people a day.
Doubling that ridership in the next 20 years or so would certainly help with road congestion.
But like it or not, planners say, new highways will continue to be part of any solution.
"We have 100,000 to 150,000 people moving into our region every year," said Doug Allen, DART's executive vice president for program development.
"They're not bringing their highways with them, and they're not bringing rail cars with them. But they are bringing their automobiles."
On Tuesday, Dallas voters will consider a ballot proposal that would kill a planned high-speed toll road inside the Trinity River levees. That measure, Proposition 1, was placed on the ballot by TrinityVote, a group led by Dallas City Council member Angela Hunt.
Ms. Hunt and other TrinityVote supporters say the proposed highway would spoil the downtown park that is also planned inside the levees, part of the city's overall effort to improve the Trinity River corridor.
Opponents of the ballot measure, led by Mayor Tom Leppert, say the toll road is needed if Dallas is to have any hope of addressing its ever-worsening highway congestion.
A report issued in September by the Texas Transportation Institute at Texas A&M University ranked the Dallas area as the nation's fifth worst for traffic delays. Drivers here waste an average of 58 hours a year in stalled traffic, the study found.
And no one expects that to get better, at least not before it gets a lot worse. North-central Texas remains one of the fastest growing and most rapidly sprawling urban areas in the U.S.
The Trinity toll road would run from U.S. Highway 175 southeast of downtown Dallas to where State Highway 183 branches off from the Stemmons Freeway near Texas Stadium. It's envisioned as a reliever route that would help ease congestion along the Stemmons and in the knot of overcrowded freeways that come together just south of downtown.
In public forums, Ms. Hunt does not dispute the need to deal with downtown traffic. But if the toll road is the answer, she contends, it can go somewhere else.
"We're not saying don't built it – we're saying don't put it in our park," she said.
The mayor and other opponents of Proposition 1 steadfastly maintain that there are no good alternative routes. The best of a bad lot, they say, would be to run the toll road up Industrial Boulevard and Irving Boulevard.
That would require relocating hundreds of existing businesses and the condemnation of hundreds of parcels of privately held land. According to estimates from the North Texas Tollway Authority, which would build and operate the Trinity toll road, putting it along Industrial would cost about $300 million more than building it inside the levees: $1.6 billion for the Industrial route, vs. $1.3 billion inside the levees.
DART's new Green Line will run from north Carrollton, along a route just east of the Stemmons Freeway, to the Victory rail station near American Airlines Center. From there, the line will head through downtown (along the Pacific Avenue route now used by DART's Red and Blue lines) and turn south to serve Deep Ellum, Baylor University Medical Center at Dallas and Fair Park. The Green Line will end at Buckner Boulevard and Elam Road in Pleasant Grove.
The first leg, from Victory to Fair Park, is to open in 2009. The line is to be completed by 2010.
An offshoot, the Orange Line, will branch off from the Green Line in the Bachman Lake area, then head west, crossing the river near Storey Lane (Spur 482) not far from Texas Stadium. From there, it will have stops serving the University of Dallas, Las Colinas, North Lake College and Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport.
The first leg of the Orange Line is to open by 2012, with completion of the line by 2014.
Other improvements planned throughout the DART system include extensions of rail lines into South Dallas, West Dallas and Rowlett; development of an east-west express line through Far North Dallas and northern suburbs out to D/FW along the Cotton Belt freight line corridor; bus service improvements; and dozens more miles of HOV lanes along highways including Interstate 30, North Central Expressway and LBJ Freeway.
"We have a very full plate between now and 2030," DART spokesman Morgan Lyons said.
The North Central Texas Council of Governments predicts that by that year, the population of the 10-county region around Dallas and Fort Worth will swell to 9.1 million, up from 5.1 million in 2000. Employment is expected to grow similarly. (The 10 counties are Dallas, Tarrant, Wise, Denton, Collin, Rockwall, Kaufman, Ellis, Johnson and Parker.)
DART's long-range plan, unanimously adopted by the agency's board a year ago, outlines the Sisyphean challenge that such growth presents.
"Nearly doubling the region's population and employment translates into a comparable increase in vehicle miles of travel and fuel consumption," the plan says.
"Although these factors increase by a factor of nearly two, congestion delay – the amount of time people are stuck in traffic – is expected to increase by a factor of five.
"This means that transportation improvements in the region cannot keep pace with population growth."
Does that mean that no matter what's done, fighting congestion is a losing battle?
Mr. Allen, the DART vice president, wouldn't concede as much.
"But," he said, "it is certainly a daunting task."
Transportation writer Michael A. Lindenberger contributed to this report.
Read more in the DMN
Showing posts with label Trinity Toll Road. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Trinity Toll Road. Show all posts
Sunday, November 4, 2007
Thursday, November 1, 2007
Ad airs from group against the Trinity Toll Road
By DAVID SCHECHTER - WFAA-TV - Wednesday, October 31, 2007
You know it's almost election time, when every time you change the channel, you come across yet another political ad.
Yesterday, there was a new Trinity Toll Road ad airing.
It was the first TV ad from the group that is against the toll road.
It attacks the other side's claims that voting against the road will result in higher taxes in Dallas.
"The lobbyist and politicians are not telling the truth about their toll road Trinity Toll Road," we are told.
"According to The Dallas Morning News,they've used suspect statistics as truth to scare us of new taxes and lost funding," the ad continues.
That's unknown.
There are no firm figures on "new taxes" and "lost funding".
Building a toll road in another location, other than the Trinity, would require the city to buy and demolish properties.
That will certainly cost more, but there is no definitive answer on how much.
As for lost funding - TxDOT says the toll road is the centerpiece to redoing the Mixmaster.
Without it, they say, the federal government will not pay for an estimate $1.5 billion in downtown road improvements.
But, it's unknown how that will actually play out.
"Their claims make several leaps and aren't backed up by proof," the ad says.
That's true but again, the cost of building the road in an alternate location is uncertain.
Toll road supporters say it will cost $500 million but they have not been able to itemize that number.
The truth is it could cost more, or less and ultimately it would have to approved by Dallas voters.
"As for those illustrations of the toll road, we've all seen the Dallas Morning News called them 'figments,'" the ad says.
That's true.
Read more on WFAA
The images of a lush and pleasing tollway were produced by the NTTA, which would own and operate the road.
But the NTTA says the images are only an approximation of what the toll road would look like and is subject to change.
That's your reality check
You know it's almost election time, when every time you change the channel, you come across yet another political ad.
Yesterday, there was a new Trinity Toll Road ad airing.
It was the first TV ad from the group that is against the toll road.
It attacks the other side's claims that voting against the road will result in higher taxes in Dallas.
"The lobbyist and politicians are not telling the truth about their toll road Trinity Toll Road," we are told.
"According to The Dallas Morning News,they've used suspect statistics as truth to scare us of new taxes and lost funding," the ad continues.
That's unknown.
There are no firm figures on "new taxes" and "lost funding".
Building a toll road in another location, other than the Trinity, would require the city to buy and demolish properties.
That will certainly cost more, but there is no definitive answer on how much.
As for lost funding - TxDOT says the toll road is the centerpiece to redoing the Mixmaster.
Without it, they say, the federal government will not pay for an estimate $1.5 billion in downtown road improvements.
But, it's unknown how that will actually play out.
"Their claims make several leaps and aren't backed up by proof," the ad says.
That's true but again, the cost of building the road in an alternate location is uncertain.
Toll road supporters say it will cost $500 million but they have not been able to itemize that number.
The truth is it could cost more, or less and ultimately it would have to approved by Dallas voters.
"As for those illustrations of the toll road, we've all seen the Dallas Morning News called them 'figments,'" the ad says.
That's true.
Read more on WFAA
The images of a lush and pleasing tollway were produced by the NTTA, which would own and operate the road.
But the NTTA says the images are only an approximation of what the toll road would look like and is subject to change.
That's your reality check
Sunday, October 21, 2007
Trinity park planners challenged to provide easy access over levees - Bridges, trails suggested as ways to enter planned oasis
By BRUCE TOMASO - The Dallas Morning News - Sunday, October 21, 2007
Designers of the Trinity River project have an ambitious vision.
They say they want to see the river transformed "from the city's back alley to its front yard."
The central element of that vision, for many people, is the proposed downtown Trinity River park. With its lakes, river meanders, hiking trails, canoeing course, greenbelts and promenades, the downtown park, at roughly 100 acres, is often extolled as having the potential to become Dallas' Central Park, or Dallas' River Walk, or Dallas' Town Lake – an urban oasis that will draw visitors from near and far.
Also Online
Interactive map: Trinity toll road issues
Map: Trinity toll road issues (.pdf)
Archive: Learn more about the Trinity toll road fight
But there's at least one big obstacle to that vision – or two, actually – having nothing to do with the Nov. 6 referendum on whether to build a toll road in the park.
Unlike Central Park, or the San Antonio River Walk, or Austin's Town Lake, the Trinity is cut off from the rest of the city by its levees – "two 30-foot mounds of dirt separated by a half-mile of weeds," in the memorable phrase of Paul Lehner, director of planning and development for the city's Trinity River Corridor Project office.
"We can't do exactly what they've done in San Antonio," said Mr. Lehner. "We won't have people who can just step out their doors and be right at the water, because of the levees. For that reason, providing connectivity to the park through a number of points has been very high on our list."
The levees, built in the 1920s and '30s to protect downtown against flooding, aren't going anywhere. In fact, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers plans to raise the levees by about two feet over the next few years.
The corps has said emphatically that whatever else is done to the river corridor – park, lakes, toll road, no toll road – flood protection remains its primary function.
So to get to the park, folks would have to find ways over those "mounds of dirt."
Dallas being Dallas, many of them would drive. Their access to the park depends very much on what happens Nov. 6, when voters will weigh in on Proposition 1, a ballot measure to scrap the high-speed toll road now planned inside the levees.
Whether that toll road is built – and, if it isn't, what gets built instead – will affect many aspects of the Trinity project, from its funding sources to its build-out schedule to the aesthetics of the park to transportation through and to the central city. One of few things that both sides agree on in the toll road debate is that a lot of uncertainty looms – and a lot of recalibration will have to take place – if Proposition 1 passes and the toll road is scrapped.
In ways big or small, the vote could alter almost everything and anything about the park. So all of what follows is open to change. There are lots of things we simply don't know about how the Trinity project might look.
But for now, let us forget about toll roads, figuratively park our cars, lace up our walking shoes and take a stroll through some of the plans for ways that Dallas residents would be able to get to, and enjoy, their park on foot.
Reunion Overlook
This would be one of the prime entry points to the downtown park – and, Mr. Lehner hopes, a gathering point in and of itself.
Reunion Boulevard is the short roadway off Houston Street that now passes the Hyatt Regency Dallas, Reunion Tower and Reunion Arena before dead-ending at Industrial Boulevard.
Under its plans, the city would extend the boulevard another few hundred feet to the west, to the river levee. There, a building of some sort could be built – there is no final design now – at the level of the levee top. The building could house an information center, perhaps a history museum of the Trinity River, perhaps concession stands. From it, there would be "vertical access" via elevators or stairways, down into the river bottoms. At that point, visitors would be in the park, at the promenade along the water.
Mr. Lehner told a City Council committee last week that the Reunion Overlook could evolve into the main "linkage between downtown and the Trinity Corridor."
The trails
The park is to include a network of trails – some near the water and some, perhaps, along the tops of the levees.
Near Sylvan Avenue, these trails would connect with the Trinity Strand Trail, a new trail network being built just outside the levees, behind the Stemmons Freeway along the original, meandering channel of the Trinity River.
The Trinity Strand Trail, in turn, would eventually hook up with the Katy Trail at a point just north of American Airlines Center.
That means hikers, joggers, bicyclists and roller-skaters could come down the Katy Trail from as far away as Southern Methodist University – and eventually farther, as the Katy Trail expands – and get into the Trinity park.
And from the Knox-Henderson neighborhood south, those visitors would never have to cross a vehicular road, said Mike Kutner, chairman of Friends of the Trinity Strand Trail, a group raising private money to complete the trail.
He also noted that there are 13 hotels, including the huge Hilton Anatole, along Stemmons Freeway within a short walk of the Trinity Strand.
"For visitors to our city to be able to walk out of their hotel and get on these trails and enter the park – that would be fantastic," he said.
DART
The Dallas Area Rapid Transit station at Eighth and Corinth streets in Oak Cliff is the southernmost station that jointly serves DART's red and blue rail lines.
The station is close to the Trinity, near where the downtown levees stop.
It's also adjacent to an abandoned railroad trestle. That old railroad bridge, city officials said, could be converted to a pedestrian bridge. Visitors from as far away as Garland or Plano could ride DART to Eighth and Corinth and use the pedestrian bridge as a way into the river bottoms.
At that point, they'd be near the northern boundary of the Great Trinity Forest, an unspoiled hardwood stand covering several thousand acres that the city is assembling. A canoe launch into the river channel is also planned at Moore Gateway Park, near the trestle.
Continental Avenue
Work has just begun on the Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge, a soaring structure by Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava that will extend the Woodall Rodgers Freeway west over the Trinity to Singleton Boulevard.
It's the first of three Calatrava "signature" bridges over the Trinity that planners hope to see completed someday. The others are at Interstate 30 and Interstate 35E.
The Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge will cost an estimated $115 million, according to the city. It's being built with $28 million in city bond proceeds, some funds from state and federal agencies, and a lot of private donations, notably from the family of Ms. Hill, the oil heiress and Dallas philanthropist who died this summer.
When the bridge is completed, the plan is to close the adjacent Continental Avenue viaduct to cars, allowing only pedestrians and bicyclists to use it.
From the east (downtown) side, the Continental bridge would provide a ready way into the park from the West End, Victory and Uptown.
On the West Dallas side, the city would build a "gateway park" that would afford spectacular park views, framed by the downtown skyline in the distance and the Calatrava bridge in the foreground.
"That becomes the Dallas postcard," Mr. Lehner said.
People walking or biking over the bridge would be directly above one of the man-made lakes that are planned as key features of the park.
"The experience," Mr. Lehner said, "will be unlike anything that you can see now in the city."
Oak Cliff
The West Dallas gateway park is one of several spots on that side from which people could enter the park. Another is a planned observation deck that would be built in North Oak Cliff, near Beckley Avenue and Commerce Street, so people could come and watch the progress as the park is built.
"It's the proverbial hole in the construction fence," Mr. Lehner said.
But really, said Bob Stimson, a former City Council member who heads the Oak Cliff Chamber of Commerce, almost anyplace along the levee on the Oak Cliff side would provide ready entry.
"When it comes to accessing the park, Oak Cliff is in a perfect position," he said. "At any number of spots, you'll be able to just walk up over the levees and enjoy this park."
He said that unfettered access is one reason the chamber supports the current Trinity River project plan, which puts all of the highway lanes on the downtown side of the river.
Mr. Stimson said he hoped that Oak Cliff's open access to the Trinity park would "give us a tremendous advantage in the eyes of developers. They'll be salivating at the chance to build over here."
TRACKING THE TRINITY TOLLWAY VOTE
What am I voting on? Passage of Proposition 1 would create a Dallas ordinance prohibiting the construction of a high-speed toll road within the Trinity River Corridor's earthen levees. If the proposition passes, any road built within the corridor would be limited to four total lanes with a 35 mph speed limit.
When to vote: Early voting on Proposition 1 begins Monday and runs through Nov. 2. Regular voting for the referendum is Nov. 6. Only registered Dallas voters may participate.
A "FOR" vote means: You want to prohibit the high-speed toll road's construction within the Trinity River's levees.
An "AGAINST" vote means: You want to preserve the current Trinity River Corridor plan, which calls for construction of the high-speed toll road within the levees.
What supporters of Proposition 1 say: A high-speed toll road would irreparably harm an adjacent urban park also planned as part of the city's broader Trinity River Corridor project. The road could be built outside the levees, along Industrial Boulevard, or elsewhere.
Supporters of the proposition say that since Dallas is endowed with a massive, empty greenspace in its city center, it should use its prime opportunity to develop it to create an urban oasis, unadulterated by a loud, unsightly highway carrying tens of thousands of vehicles each day.
They also say the toll road may be prone to flooding and would lead to more air pollution in downtown Dallas.
What opponents of Proposition 1 say: Removing the toll road from the larger Trinity project is akin to yanking on threads from a suit: It'll soon unravel.
Private funding for the park element, as well as county, state and federal funding for transportation components both related and unrelated, are contingent on the toll road being built as planned. Passage of Proposition 1 could also delay the project, which was originally passed in 1998, for years.
Opponents of the proposition say that building the road elsewhere could cost hundreds of millions of dollars more, and not building it at all would lead to unacceptable traffic congestion in downtown Dallas.
Voter turnout? Both sides expect it to be low, meaning individual votes carry more strength than in a well-attended election.
Designers of the Trinity River project have an ambitious vision.
They say they want to see the river transformed "from the city's back alley to its front yard."
The central element of that vision, for many people, is the proposed downtown Trinity River park. With its lakes, river meanders, hiking trails, canoeing course, greenbelts and promenades, the downtown park, at roughly 100 acres, is often extolled as having the potential to become Dallas' Central Park, or Dallas' River Walk, or Dallas' Town Lake – an urban oasis that will draw visitors from near and far.
Also Online
Interactive map: Trinity toll road issues
Map: Trinity toll road issues (.pdf)
Archive: Learn more about the Trinity toll road fight
But there's at least one big obstacle to that vision – or two, actually – having nothing to do with the Nov. 6 referendum on whether to build a toll road in the park.
Unlike Central Park, or the San Antonio River Walk, or Austin's Town Lake, the Trinity is cut off from the rest of the city by its levees – "two 30-foot mounds of dirt separated by a half-mile of weeds," in the memorable phrase of Paul Lehner, director of planning and development for the city's Trinity River Corridor Project office.
"We can't do exactly what they've done in San Antonio," said Mr. Lehner. "We won't have people who can just step out their doors and be right at the water, because of the levees. For that reason, providing connectivity to the park through a number of points has been very high on our list."
The levees, built in the 1920s and '30s to protect downtown against flooding, aren't going anywhere. In fact, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers plans to raise the levees by about two feet over the next few years.
The corps has said emphatically that whatever else is done to the river corridor – park, lakes, toll road, no toll road – flood protection remains its primary function.
So to get to the park, folks would have to find ways over those "mounds of dirt."
Dallas being Dallas, many of them would drive. Their access to the park depends very much on what happens Nov. 6, when voters will weigh in on Proposition 1, a ballot measure to scrap the high-speed toll road now planned inside the levees.
Whether that toll road is built – and, if it isn't, what gets built instead – will affect many aspects of the Trinity project, from its funding sources to its build-out schedule to the aesthetics of the park to transportation through and to the central city. One of few things that both sides agree on in the toll road debate is that a lot of uncertainty looms – and a lot of recalibration will have to take place – if Proposition 1 passes and the toll road is scrapped.
In ways big or small, the vote could alter almost everything and anything about the park. So all of what follows is open to change. There are lots of things we simply don't know about how the Trinity project might look.
But for now, let us forget about toll roads, figuratively park our cars, lace up our walking shoes and take a stroll through some of the plans for ways that Dallas residents would be able to get to, and enjoy, their park on foot.
Reunion Overlook
This would be one of the prime entry points to the downtown park – and, Mr. Lehner hopes, a gathering point in and of itself.
Reunion Boulevard is the short roadway off Houston Street that now passes the Hyatt Regency Dallas, Reunion Tower and Reunion Arena before dead-ending at Industrial Boulevard.
Under its plans, the city would extend the boulevard another few hundred feet to the west, to the river levee. There, a building of some sort could be built – there is no final design now – at the level of the levee top. The building could house an information center, perhaps a history museum of the Trinity River, perhaps concession stands. From it, there would be "vertical access" via elevators or stairways, down into the river bottoms. At that point, visitors would be in the park, at the promenade along the water.
Mr. Lehner told a City Council committee last week that the Reunion Overlook could evolve into the main "linkage between downtown and the Trinity Corridor."
The trails
The park is to include a network of trails – some near the water and some, perhaps, along the tops of the levees.
Near Sylvan Avenue, these trails would connect with the Trinity Strand Trail, a new trail network being built just outside the levees, behind the Stemmons Freeway along the original, meandering channel of the Trinity River.
The Trinity Strand Trail, in turn, would eventually hook up with the Katy Trail at a point just north of American Airlines Center.
That means hikers, joggers, bicyclists and roller-skaters could come down the Katy Trail from as far away as Southern Methodist University – and eventually farther, as the Katy Trail expands – and get into the Trinity park.
And from the Knox-Henderson neighborhood south, those visitors would never have to cross a vehicular road, said Mike Kutner, chairman of Friends of the Trinity Strand Trail, a group raising private money to complete the trail.
He also noted that there are 13 hotels, including the huge Hilton Anatole, along Stemmons Freeway within a short walk of the Trinity Strand.
"For visitors to our city to be able to walk out of their hotel and get on these trails and enter the park – that would be fantastic," he said.
DART
The Dallas Area Rapid Transit station at Eighth and Corinth streets in Oak Cliff is the southernmost station that jointly serves DART's red and blue rail lines.
The station is close to the Trinity, near where the downtown levees stop.
It's also adjacent to an abandoned railroad trestle. That old railroad bridge, city officials said, could be converted to a pedestrian bridge. Visitors from as far away as Garland or Plano could ride DART to Eighth and Corinth and use the pedestrian bridge as a way into the river bottoms.
At that point, they'd be near the northern boundary of the Great Trinity Forest, an unspoiled hardwood stand covering several thousand acres that the city is assembling. A canoe launch into the river channel is also planned at Moore Gateway Park, near the trestle.
Continental Avenue
Work has just begun on the Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge, a soaring structure by Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava that will extend the Woodall Rodgers Freeway west over the Trinity to Singleton Boulevard.
It's the first of three Calatrava "signature" bridges over the Trinity that planners hope to see completed someday. The others are at Interstate 30 and Interstate 35E.
The Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge will cost an estimated $115 million, according to the city. It's being built with $28 million in city bond proceeds, some funds from state and federal agencies, and a lot of private donations, notably from the family of Ms. Hill, the oil heiress and Dallas philanthropist who died this summer.
When the bridge is completed, the plan is to close the adjacent Continental Avenue viaduct to cars, allowing only pedestrians and bicyclists to use it.
From the east (downtown) side, the Continental bridge would provide a ready way into the park from the West End, Victory and Uptown.
On the West Dallas side, the city would build a "gateway park" that would afford spectacular park views, framed by the downtown skyline in the distance and the Calatrava bridge in the foreground.
"That becomes the Dallas postcard," Mr. Lehner said.
People walking or biking over the bridge would be directly above one of the man-made lakes that are planned as key features of the park.
"The experience," Mr. Lehner said, "will be unlike anything that you can see now in the city."
Oak Cliff
The West Dallas gateway park is one of several spots on that side from which people could enter the park. Another is a planned observation deck that would be built in North Oak Cliff, near Beckley Avenue and Commerce Street, so people could come and watch the progress as the park is built.
"It's the proverbial hole in the construction fence," Mr. Lehner said.
But really, said Bob Stimson, a former City Council member who heads the Oak Cliff Chamber of Commerce, almost anyplace along the levee on the Oak Cliff side would provide ready entry.
"When it comes to accessing the park, Oak Cliff is in a perfect position," he said. "At any number of spots, you'll be able to just walk up over the levees and enjoy this park."
He said that unfettered access is one reason the chamber supports the current Trinity River project plan, which puts all of the highway lanes on the downtown side of the river.
Mr. Stimson said he hoped that Oak Cliff's open access to the Trinity park would "give us a tremendous advantage in the eyes of developers. They'll be salivating at the chance to build over here."
TRACKING THE TRINITY TOLLWAY VOTE
What am I voting on? Passage of Proposition 1 would create a Dallas ordinance prohibiting the construction of a high-speed toll road within the Trinity River Corridor's earthen levees. If the proposition passes, any road built within the corridor would be limited to four total lanes with a 35 mph speed limit.
When to vote: Early voting on Proposition 1 begins Monday and runs through Nov. 2. Regular voting for the referendum is Nov. 6. Only registered Dallas voters may participate.
A "FOR" vote means: You want to prohibit the high-speed toll road's construction within the Trinity River's levees.
An "AGAINST" vote means: You want to preserve the current Trinity River Corridor plan, which calls for construction of the high-speed toll road within the levees.
What supporters of Proposition 1 say: A high-speed toll road would irreparably harm an adjacent urban park also planned as part of the city's broader Trinity River Corridor project. The road could be built outside the levees, along Industrial Boulevard, or elsewhere.
Supporters of the proposition say that since Dallas is endowed with a massive, empty greenspace in its city center, it should use its prime opportunity to develop it to create an urban oasis, unadulterated by a loud, unsightly highway carrying tens of thousands of vehicles each day.
They also say the toll road may be prone to flooding and would lead to more air pollution in downtown Dallas.
What opponents of Proposition 1 say: Removing the toll road from the larger Trinity project is akin to yanking on threads from a suit: It'll soon unravel.
Private funding for the park element, as well as county, state and federal funding for transportation components both related and unrelated, are contingent on the toll road being built as planned. Passage of Proposition 1 could also delay the project, which was originally passed in 1998, for years.
Opponents of the proposition say that building the road elsewhere could cost hundreds of millions of dollars more, and not building it at all would lead to unacceptable traffic congestion in downtown Dallas.
Voter turnout? Both sides expect it to be low, meaning individual votes carry more strength than in a well-attended election.
Saturday, October 20, 2007
When NO means YES and YES means NO - Dallas Votes Nov. 6th on whether they want a toll road in Trinity Park
By Faith Chatham - DFWRCC - Oct. 21, 2007
Photos used by permission of Tom Blackwell
Flags mark the route of the proposed toll road in Trinity Park, Dallas. Voters will decide whether they want the toll road through the park.
A YES VOTE means that NO TOLL ROAD IS WANTED IN THE PARK.
A NO VOTE means that you WANT THE TOLL ROAD THROUGH THE PARK.
Below is a picture of the park where the proposed Trinity Toll Road is planned. Opponents (urging voters to vote YES) say too much land will be taken out of the park. The Toll Road will be high speed, without access to the park.
Photos used by permission of Tom Blackwell
Flags mark the route of the proposed toll road in Trinity Park, Dallas. Voters will decide whether they want the toll road through the park.
A YES VOTE means that NO TOLL ROAD IS WANTED IN THE PARK.
A NO VOTE means that you WANT THE TOLL ROAD THROUGH THE PARK.
Below is a picture of the park where the proposed Trinity Toll Road is planned. Opponents (urging voters to vote YES) say too much land will be taken out of the park. The Toll Road will be high speed, without access to the park.
Wednesday, October 17, 2007
Dallas lawmaker stalls funding for Fort Worth's river project - A Trinity tug of war
By MARIA RECIO - Star-Telegram Staff Writer - Oct. 17, 2007
Much of the area to the northwest of downtown Fort Worth would be redeveloped as part of the Trinity River Vision. The $435-million project would create an urban waterfront on the Trinity, opening it to recreation, green spaces, and residential and commercial development.
WASHINGTON -- For the first time in seven years, Congress has approved a massive $23.2 billion water projects bill that includes years of backed-up requests for flood control projects and improvements to rivers and harbors by the Army Corps of Engineers.
The bill includes funds for an $80 million Johnson Creek restoration project in Arlington, but there is something missing from Tarrant County's wish list: funding for a key aspect of Fort Worth's Trinity River Vision project. That's the city's $435 million showcase effort to redesign itself by creating an urban waterfront on the Trinity River, opening it to recreation, green spaces and residential and commercial development.
The tangled tale involves some political miscalculations, confusion over the changing nature of the project and the always baffling congressional funding process.
Rep. Kay Granger, R-Fort Worth, the central figure in the case, has worked tirelessly to promote the project in recent years. But this year she ran into a formidable obstacle: Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson, D-Dallas, the new chairwoman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee's Water Resources and Environment Subcommittee.
The roadblock put up by Johnson is unlikely to stall Fort Worth's project for long. But it's a reality check and a reminder that nothing is certain in Congress and that local opposition to a local project can make things more difficult. Tarrant County Democrats oppose the project, and they are taking their complaints to new House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif.
Granger and others pushing for Trinity River Vision are confident that they will prevail and get full funding for Fort Worth's signature project.
Project history
Beginning in 2000, Granger, a former Fort Worth mayor, used her position on the House Appropriations Committee to direct funding, initially in small amounts, for environmental studies on the Trinity River project. Then, in 2004, after a water resources bill collapsed, she bypassed regular channels and obtained congressional authorization of $220 million for the Central City project, which is the Corps of Engineers' name for the flood control work in Fort Worth.
Granger's 2004 move was something of a coup because she succeeded in getting the Central City project "authorized" on an appropriation bill.
Congressional committees are split into authorizing panels, which set policy and overall funding levels, and the appropriations committee, which amounts to check-writers who direct the specific annual amounts that agencies can spend.
Members zealously guard their turf, as Granger discovered this year.
Johnson, who became chairman in January after the Democrats won control of Congress, blocked Granger's request for an authorization for the full cost of the Central City project, which incorporated $27.3 million for a neighboring project called the Riverside Oxbow. Under the plan, flood controls involving costly easements in west Fort Worth could be replaced by diverting water to the 600-acre Riverside Oxbow, which includes a dry bend of the Trinity in east Fort Worth.
But Johnson did not consider the Fort Worth Central City project to be one that was already in the works for Corps funding. Rather, she declared it would be considered a new project.
"We had taken a vote on our committee and unanimously said we would not consider any new projects," Johnson said in an interview. "We'll consider it when we start a new bill."
Johnson said that work will begin shortly on a new bill, assuming that the current water projects bill becomes law. Congress appears to have the votes to override a threatened veto from President Bush, who believes the bill is too costly.
Granger said she talked to Johnson about the Central City project in March, although the Dallas Democrat said, "I wasn't even aware of it until the day we were doing a mark-up," or vote, on the water projects bill.
Help from Hutchison
Stymied on the House side, Granger turned to Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas, who inserted $247 million for the project in the Senate version of the bill -- the amount approved in 2004 plus the $27.3 million for the Riverside Oxbow.
When the bill went to a conference committee this summer to work out the differences between the House and Senate bills, Johnson again opposed the Trinity project and the funding was removed in the final conference even though the overall bill grew from $14 billion in the Senate and $15 billion in the House into a $23 billion projects bill.
"That was a problem on the House side," Hutchison said in an interview. "We definitely tried and Kay [Granger] tried very, very hard to get it in." Neither Hutchison nor Granger was on the conference committee.
Johnson, for her part, said, "I didn't want to add any new projects" and said she had the support of the leaders of her panel in the negotiations.
Johnson was successful in securing funds for her own Trinity River project in the bill: $298 million in authorization for flood control, wetlands and bridge modifications for Dallas' Trinity River Corridor. The Dallas project is separate from Fort Worth's but one House aide said that Johnson was clear "that there would be one Trinity River project" in the bill.
Johnson also did not block the $80 million Johnson Creek project in Arlington.
By Aug. 1, when the House passed the conference report bill on water projects, Granger was already looking ahead to next year's Water Resources Development Act. The conference report did not include the Central City funding and could not be amended on the floor.
In August, Granger brought Rep. John Mica, R-Fla., the ranking Republican on the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, to tour the project area.
"I have a very strong commitment to put it in whatever measure I can," Mica said Wednesday in the Capitol. "I guess there was some conflict with Ms. Johnson." Of the project, he said, "It makes a lot of sense, in my opinion. Hopefully, we can get a meeting of the minds and get it in the next measure."
Granger was upbeat in a recent interview. "It will be in the second WRDA bill," she said of the Fort Worth project.
"I don't consider it a setback," she said. "The next WRDA bill won't be so huge," making it more likely the project could stay in.
As for Johnson, Granger said, "She had a briefing -- absolutely." And the Central City project, said Granger, "is not a new start."
Although Granger stressed that the entire $435 million Trinity River Vision project, which splits costs 50-50 between federal and local sources, will have to be authorized "at some point," she said the Corps will continue to get funding for it through the appropriations process.
"I'm not worried about it," said Granger, noting the project is ahead of schedule. "We're in fine shape. There's no concern."
In the appropriations bills for fiscal year 2008, House-passed bills include $8 million for construction, $1 million for bridge construction and $550,000 for economic development for Central City Fort Worth. The levels will still have to be negotiated with the Senate.
JOHNSON CREEK
The Tarrant County project that did receive funding in the recent water bill is the new Johnson Creek restoration project that has been more than a decade in the works. The project, expected to start soon, will help stabilize creek banks, add trails and other recreational amenities, and a new pedestrian bridge between the new Cowboys stadium and the future Glorypark development. Local officials have said the total cost of the project is expected to be $50 million. But the water bill said the overall cost is $80 million, with as much as $52 million coming from the federal government.
Read more in the Fort Worth Star Telegram
Much of the area to the northwest of downtown Fort Worth would be redeveloped as part of the Trinity River Vision. The $435-million project would create an urban waterfront on the Trinity, opening it to recreation, green spaces, and residential and commercial development.
WASHINGTON -- For the first time in seven years, Congress has approved a massive $23.2 billion water projects bill that includes years of backed-up requests for flood control projects and improvements to rivers and harbors by the Army Corps of Engineers.
The bill includes funds for an $80 million Johnson Creek restoration project in Arlington, but there is something missing from Tarrant County's wish list: funding for a key aspect of Fort Worth's Trinity River Vision project. That's the city's $435 million showcase effort to redesign itself by creating an urban waterfront on the Trinity River, opening it to recreation, green spaces and residential and commercial development.
The tangled tale involves some political miscalculations, confusion over the changing nature of the project and the always baffling congressional funding process.
Rep. Kay Granger, R-Fort Worth, the central figure in the case, has worked tirelessly to promote the project in recent years. But this year she ran into a formidable obstacle: Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson, D-Dallas, the new chairwoman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee's Water Resources and Environment Subcommittee.
The roadblock put up by Johnson is unlikely to stall Fort Worth's project for long. But it's a reality check and a reminder that nothing is certain in Congress and that local opposition to a local project can make things more difficult. Tarrant County Democrats oppose the project, and they are taking their complaints to new House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif.
Granger and others pushing for Trinity River Vision are confident that they will prevail and get full funding for Fort Worth's signature project.
Project history
Beginning in 2000, Granger, a former Fort Worth mayor, used her position on the House Appropriations Committee to direct funding, initially in small amounts, for environmental studies on the Trinity River project. Then, in 2004, after a water resources bill collapsed, she bypassed regular channels and obtained congressional authorization of $220 million for the Central City project, which is the Corps of Engineers' name for the flood control work in Fort Worth.
Granger's 2004 move was something of a coup because she succeeded in getting the Central City project "authorized" on an appropriation bill.
Congressional committees are split into authorizing panels, which set policy and overall funding levels, and the appropriations committee, which amounts to check-writers who direct the specific annual amounts that agencies can spend.
Members zealously guard their turf, as Granger discovered this year.
Johnson, who became chairman in January after the Democrats won control of Congress, blocked Granger's request for an authorization for the full cost of the Central City project, which incorporated $27.3 million for a neighboring project called the Riverside Oxbow. Under the plan, flood controls involving costly easements in west Fort Worth could be replaced by diverting water to the 600-acre Riverside Oxbow, which includes a dry bend of the Trinity in east Fort Worth.
But Johnson did not consider the Fort Worth Central City project to be one that was already in the works for Corps funding. Rather, she declared it would be considered a new project.
"We had taken a vote on our committee and unanimously said we would not consider any new projects," Johnson said in an interview. "We'll consider it when we start a new bill."
Johnson said that work will begin shortly on a new bill, assuming that the current water projects bill becomes law. Congress appears to have the votes to override a threatened veto from President Bush, who believes the bill is too costly.
Granger said she talked to Johnson about the Central City project in March, although the Dallas Democrat said, "I wasn't even aware of it until the day we were doing a mark-up," or vote, on the water projects bill.
Help from Hutchison
Stymied on the House side, Granger turned to Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas, who inserted $247 million for the project in the Senate version of the bill -- the amount approved in 2004 plus the $27.3 million for the Riverside Oxbow.
When the bill went to a conference committee this summer to work out the differences between the House and Senate bills, Johnson again opposed the Trinity project and the funding was removed in the final conference even though the overall bill grew from $14 billion in the Senate and $15 billion in the House into a $23 billion projects bill.
"That was a problem on the House side," Hutchison said in an interview. "We definitely tried and Kay [Granger] tried very, very hard to get it in." Neither Hutchison nor Granger was on the conference committee.
Johnson, for her part, said, "I didn't want to add any new projects" and said she had the support of the leaders of her panel in the negotiations.
Johnson was successful in securing funds for her own Trinity River project in the bill: $298 million in authorization for flood control, wetlands and bridge modifications for Dallas' Trinity River Corridor. The Dallas project is separate from Fort Worth's but one House aide said that Johnson was clear "that there would be one Trinity River project" in the bill.
Johnson also did not block the $80 million Johnson Creek project in Arlington.
By Aug. 1, when the House passed the conference report bill on water projects, Granger was already looking ahead to next year's Water Resources Development Act. The conference report did not include the Central City funding and could not be amended on the floor.
In August, Granger brought Rep. John Mica, R-Fla., the ranking Republican on the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, to tour the project area.
"I have a very strong commitment to put it in whatever measure I can," Mica said Wednesday in the Capitol. "I guess there was some conflict with Ms. Johnson." Of the project, he said, "It makes a lot of sense, in my opinion. Hopefully, we can get a meeting of the minds and get it in the next measure."
Granger was upbeat in a recent interview. "It will be in the second WRDA bill," she said of the Fort Worth project.
"I don't consider it a setback," she said. "The next WRDA bill won't be so huge," making it more likely the project could stay in.
As for Johnson, Granger said, "She had a briefing -- absolutely." And the Central City project, said Granger, "is not a new start."
Although Granger stressed that the entire $435 million Trinity River Vision project, which splits costs 50-50 between federal and local sources, will have to be authorized "at some point," she said the Corps will continue to get funding for it through the appropriations process.
"I'm not worried about it," said Granger, noting the project is ahead of schedule. "We're in fine shape. There's no concern."
In the appropriations bills for fiscal year 2008, House-passed bills include $8 million for construction, $1 million for bridge construction and $550,000 for economic development for Central City Fort Worth. The levels will still have to be negotiated with the Senate.
JOHNSON CREEK
The Tarrant County project that did receive funding in the recent water bill is the new Johnson Creek restoration project that has been more than a decade in the works. The project, expected to start soon, will help stabilize creek banks, add trails and other recreational amenities, and a new pedestrian bridge between the new Cowboys stadium and the future Glorypark development. Local officials have said the total cost of the project is expected to be $50 million. But the water bill said the overall cost is $80 million, with as much as $52 million coming from the federal government.
Read more in the Fort Worth Star Telegram
Saturday, September 29, 2007
City staffers accused of taking sides on Trinity toll road
By RUDOLPH BUSH, BRUCE TOMASO and DAVE LEVINTHAL - The Dallas Morning News - Saturday, September 29, 2007
Top Dallas city staff members appear to have a cozy relationship with leading advocates for the Trinity River toll road, a series of e-mails among them shows. The disclosure has infuriated toll road opponents and caused City Manager Mary Suhm to caution her top deputies about politicking on the job.
For instance, in a July 6 e-mail, Rebecca Dugger, director of the city office overseeing the Trinity project, encouraged toll road supporters to call a radio talk show to give a positive view of the project.
Twenty days later, toll road backer and former City Council member Craig Holcomb asked Ms. Dugger if she could assist him in making a presentation before the Oak Cliff Chamber of Commerce.
And in an Aug. 15 e-mail to Ms. Suhm, Ms. Dugger and other staff members, Mr. Holcomb felt free to take a swipe at council member Angela Hunt, the toll road's chief opponent.
The e-mail was intended to arrange a meeting between city staff and the nonprofit Trinity Trust organization and asked if the group could meet at the Original House of Pancakes. Mr. Holcomb liked the location "[f]or nostalgia's sake, to remember the days before AH," he wrote in reference to Ms. Hunt.
Mr. Holcomb said Friday that he had never asked the city staff to do anything inappropriate and that the staff never had.
He acknowledged being friends with Ms. Dugger and many others at City Hall, and he made no apologies for that.
Regarding his joke about Ms. Hunt, he said, "One council member out of 15 wants to derail the Trinity project, and I don't see anything wrong with being nostalgic for a time when that was not the case and we could all work together."
City staffers are prohibited from advocating for one side during an election, and Ms. Suhm said her staff has been careful to avoid taking a position on the Nov. 6 referendum on the toll road project.
But long-standing friendly relationships between some staff members and toll road proponents have at least led to the appearance that the city has gone out of its way to assist those who would see the referendum fail so the road can be built.
Former Dallas City Council member Donna Blumer, who opposes the toll road project, said she was shocked by the e-mails.
Ms. Hunt said that the e-mail exchanges "undermine any argument the city has that they're being neutral on this issue." But she does not plan to pursue the matter through legal or ethical channels.
Mayor Tom Leppert, who said he had not seen the e-mails in question, said the city staff should remain neutral and has tried to do so.
Voters will decide Nov. 6 whether a high-speed highway can be built inside the Trinity River levees. A yes vote prohibits such a highway. A no vote would allow the city's plans to go forward.
The Dallas Morning News obtained hundreds of e-mails originating at City Hall regarding the toll road project, using the state's open records law. The vast majority were between city staff and toll road proponents. Only a handful were from those who oppose the toll road and did not involve requests for information.
Defending the staff
Ms. Suhm broadly defended her staff's handling of what she said has become a delicate, even precarious, balancing act on the Trinity project.
City staffers are required to help the city realize a "Balanced Vision Plan," ordered by the City Council, that calls for the construction of a toll road between the Trinity levees downtown, Ms. Suhm said.
But they aren't permitted to advocate for or against a referendum that, if successful, would undermine that plan.
Further complicating matters is the fact that leading referendum opponents are City Hall insiders, from former council members and mayors to a former city manager.
As recently as Tuesday, Ms. Suhm cautioned her top deputies about how to handle requests for information about the Trinity project, she said.
As for Ms. Dugger's e-mails with Mr. Holcomb, Ms. Suhm acknowledged the two are personally close and said that led to an overly friendly tone in the e-mails between them.
She added that while she might have handled the matter of the radio talk show differently, she believes Ms. Dugger acted appropriately when she declined to go on the show.
Ms. Dugger also defended her correspondence.
Other e-mails
Ms. Suhm also was the recipient of friendly e-mails from toll road backers seeking help or information.
On July 5, she received a request from former City Manager Jan Hart Black, now the president of the Greater Dallas Chamber of Commerce.
Ms. Suhm said Friday that the city regularly fulfills requests for presentations on the Trinity project. Ms. Hart Black also defended the request.
In a July 18 e-mail, toll road backer and former City Council member Donna Halstead asked Ms. Suhm to personally review a poll intended to gauge support for the Trinity River toll road plan.
Ms. Halstead said the request was one of many she has made of Ms. Suhm regarding a variety of topics.
"Mary and I have known each other for many years. I ask her and others at City Hall questions all the time," said Ms. Halstead, who heads the Dallas Citizens Council. "I'm very lucky that they feel comfortable giving me answers."
Ms. Suhm acknowledged receiving Ms. Halstead's e-mail regarding the poll. She said she reviewed the poll for factual errors.
"If the other side came and asked us questions or asked us to speak about [the project], we would," she said.
City staff members are permitted to answer factual questions from the public regarding city projects, but Ms. Hunt questioned Ms. Suhm's decision to review the poll.
Texas Ethics Commission attorney Tim Sorrells said e-mail traffic of this nature doesn't appear to fall under his office's purview.
City Attorney Tom Perkins, meanwhile, declined to comment on his office's involvement, if any, in such a matter. Mr. Perkins did note that "we have certainly discussed with staff the permissible parameters of what they should or shouldn't do in a campaign."
Mr. Leppert, meanwhile, said he wants to make sure there isn't any appearance of bias on the part of the city's staff.
Mr. Leppert, who has become the major voice of the toll road supporters, said that it doesn't help his cause to have the staff seen as tilting toward one side or the other.
THE RULES FOR CITY OFFICIALS, EMPLOYEES
Read more in the Dallas Morning News
Top Dallas city staff members appear to have a cozy relationship with leading advocates for the Trinity River toll road, a series of e-mails among them shows. The disclosure has infuriated toll road opponents and caused City Manager Mary Suhm to caution her top deputies about politicking on the job.
For instance, in a July 6 e-mail, Rebecca Dugger, director of the city office overseeing the Trinity project, encouraged toll road supporters to call a radio talk show to give a positive view of the project.
"I am not going to call. Hope you can," Ms. Dugger wrote in response to a request that she call the show.
Twenty days later, toll road backer and former City Council member Craig Holcomb asked Ms. Dugger if she could assist him in making a presentation before the Oak Cliff Chamber of Commerce.
"I would LOVE to partner with you. ... Do you want me to attend as a backup/visual eye candy?" Ms. Dugger responded.
And in an Aug. 15 e-mail to Ms. Suhm, Ms. Dugger and other staff members, Mr. Holcomb felt free to take a swipe at council member Angela Hunt, the toll road's chief opponent.
The e-mail was intended to arrange a meeting between city staff and the nonprofit Trinity Trust organization and asked if the group could meet at the Original House of Pancakes. Mr. Holcomb liked the location "[f]or nostalgia's sake, to remember the days before AH," he wrote in reference to Ms. Hunt.
Mr. Holcomb said Friday that he had never asked the city staff to do anything inappropriate and that the staff never had.
He acknowledged being friends with Ms. Dugger and many others at City Hall, and he made no apologies for that.
"If you work with somebody for five years on a project, you get to be friends," he said. "It's deeply troubling to me that because you share a joke with someone in an e-mail, that anyone would question your integrity."
Regarding his joke about Ms. Hunt, he said, "One council member out of 15 wants to derail the Trinity project, and I don't see anything wrong with being nostalgic for a time when that was not the case and we could all work together."
City staffers are prohibited from advocating for one side during an election, and Ms. Suhm said her staff has been careful to avoid taking a position on the Nov. 6 referendum on the toll road project.
But long-standing friendly relationships between some staff members and toll road proponents have at least led to the appearance that the city has gone out of its way to assist those who would see the referendum fail so the road can be built.
Former Dallas City Council member Donna Blumer, who opposes the toll road project, said she was shocked by the e-mails.
"They're pretty damning ... city staff is collaborating with the Vote No! campaign," she said.
Ms. Hunt said that the e-mail exchanges "undermine any argument the city has that they're being neutral on this issue." But she does not plan to pursue the matter through legal or ethical channels.
"I'm focused on November 6th, getting our referendum passed and making sure we get the park we want and not a giant toll road in a floodway. Going forward with it doesn't win this election," Ms. Hunt said.
Mayor Tom Leppert, who said he had not seen the e-mails in question, said the city staff should remain neutral and has tried to do so.
Voters will decide Nov. 6 whether a high-speed highway can be built inside the Trinity River levees. A yes vote prohibits such a highway. A no vote would allow the city's plans to go forward.
The Dallas Morning News obtained hundreds of e-mails originating at City Hall regarding the toll road project, using the state's open records law. The vast majority were between city staff and toll road proponents. Only a handful were from those who oppose the toll road and did not involve requests for information.
Defending the staff
Ms. Suhm broadly defended her staff's handling of what she said has become a delicate, even precarious, balancing act on the Trinity project.
City staffers are required to help the city realize a "Balanced Vision Plan," ordered by the City Council, that calls for the construction of a toll road between the Trinity levees downtown, Ms. Suhm said.
But they aren't permitted to advocate for or against a referendum that, if successful, would undermine that plan.
Further complicating matters is the fact that leading referendum opponents are City Hall insiders, from former council members and mayors to a former city manager.
"It's a hard line. We talk about it all the time," Ms. Suhm said.
As recently as Tuesday, Ms. Suhm cautioned her top deputies about how to handle requests for information about the Trinity project, she said.
"I have been completely wound up about this since the start. I have been a major league nag," she said.
As for Ms. Dugger's e-mails with Mr. Holcomb, Ms. Suhm acknowledged the two are personally close and said that led to an overly friendly tone in the e-mails between them.
"I talked to her. I said, 'I know y'all are friends, but you need to keep the friendship part out of the business part,' " Ms. Suhm said.
She added that while she might have handled the matter of the radio talk show differently, she believes Ms. Dugger acted appropriately when she declined to go on the show.
"I would be concerned if she had called [in]," Ms. Suhm said.
Ms. Dugger also defended her correspondence.
"My basic concern is for the facts to be told. If I feel like the facts are not being told, and if others have the facts, then they should get those facts out there," she said.
Other e-mails
Ms. Suhm also was the recipient of friendly e-mails from toll road backers seeking help or information.
On July 5, she received a request from former City Manager Jan Hart Black, now the president of the Greater Dallas Chamber of Commerce.
"We will need a presentation from city staff on the issues and consequences of a successful election," Ms. Hart Black wrote.
Ms. Suhm said Friday that the city regularly fulfills requests for presentations on the Trinity project. Ms. Hart Black also defended the request.
"The city has a responsibility to respond and to provide us information and answer our questions. We request information from City Hall on many issues," Ms. Hart Black said in a prepared statement. "I am sorry that Angela Hunt is attacking city staff for simply doing their job."
In a July 18 e-mail, toll road backer and former City Council member Donna Halstead asked Ms. Suhm to personally review a poll intended to gauge support for the Trinity River toll road plan.
Ms. Halstead said the request was one of many she has made of Ms. Suhm regarding a variety of topics.
"Mary and I have known each other for many years. I ask her and others at City Hall questions all the time," said Ms. Halstead, who heads the Dallas Citizens Council. "I'm very lucky that they feel comfortable giving me answers."
Ms. Suhm acknowledged receiving Ms. Halstead's e-mail regarding the poll. She said she reviewed the poll for factual errors.
"If the other side came and asked us questions or asked us to speak about [the project], we would," she said.
City staff members are permitted to answer factual questions from the public regarding city projects, but Ms. Hunt questioned Ms. Suhm's decision to review the poll.
"I find it unusual that the city manager of the ninth-largest city in America is doing fact-checking on a partisan poll. ... What's she doing? Spell-checking?" Ms. Hunt said.
Texas Ethics Commission attorney Tim Sorrells said e-mail traffic of this nature doesn't appear to fall under his office's purview.
City Attorney Tom Perkins, meanwhile, declined to comment on his office's involvement, if any, in such a matter. Mr. Perkins did note that "we have certainly discussed with staff the permissible parameters of what they should or shouldn't do in a campaign."
Mr. Leppert, meanwhile, said he wants to make sure there isn't any appearance of bias on the part of the city's staff.
"My view is everybody is doing their best to play this thing as neutral and down the middle as they can," he said.
Mr. Leppert, who has become the major voice of the toll road supporters, said that it doesn't help his cause to have the staff seen as tilting toward one side or the other.
"I don't want it to be an issue," he said.
THE RULES FOR CITY OFFICIALS, EMPLOYEES
Dallas Administrative Assistant City Attorney Jesus Toscano sent a four-page memorandum to the City Council, City Manager Mary Suhm and her assistant city managers in August explaining what actions city officials and employees may take during the Trinity campaign. Mr. Toscano wrote that employees:Dave Levinthal
• May not use city facilities, personnel, equipment or supplies in support of or in opposition to the measure, except to the extent and in accordance with the terms that those city resources are generally available to the public.
• May be involved in political activities outside of work that support or oppose the measure, but cannot use their city titles.
• May participate in fundraising activities supporting or opposing the measure in his/her individual capacity, but not on city time.
• May not use the prestige of their position with the city on behalf of a political committee. This also applies to a city measure, if political committees have been formed to support or oppose the measure.
• May make personal contributions to political committees supporting or opposing the measure.
• May place campaign signs in their yards and on the premises of their homes supporting or opposing the measure.
• May display campaign bumper stickers supporting or opposing the measure on their personal vehicles (but not on any city vehicles under the employee's control).
• Should not push any subordinate employee to participate in an election campaign, contribute to a political committee, engage in any other political activity or refrain from engaging in any lawful political activity. A general statement merely encouraging another person to vote does not violate this provision.
Read more in the Dallas Morning News
Tuesday, August 28, 2007
Environmental Stewardship - Bush Administration lists Trinity Parkway as Priority!
From US Federal Government Websites
President Bush issued Executive Order 13274 on September 18, 2002 to enhance environmental stewardship and streamline the decision-making process in connection with major transportation projects. Visit the Environmental Stewardship and Transportation Infrastructure Project Reviews web site to find out more about the implementation of Executive Order 13274.
Department of Transportation Priority Project List
1. Interstate 5 North Coast - California. The I-5 North Coast Project will construct additional general-purpose lanes, a HOV/Managed Lane facility, and operational improvements on I-5 from San Diego to Oceanside. In addition to those 26 miles of improvements, the project also will include a two-mile segment of Interstate 805 in San Diego.
2. Route 11 Extension - Connecticut. This project will complete the Route 11 freeway, a distance of 8.5 miles. The project will extend the freeway from Salem to Interstate 95 in East Lyme/Waterford. The construction of Route 11 started in the 1970s, but a lack of funding prevented its completion. The project was reinitiated in 1997.
3. US Route 411 Connector - Georgia. The purpose of the proposed US 411 Connector is to improve connectivity by providing a more direct link between US 411 and I-75. The project will separate through traffic from locally generated traffic, reducing congestion in the corridor. US 411 is a critical link in Georgia's portion of the Atlanta to Memphis Highway.
4. Interstate Highway 66 - Kentucky. The proposed project is a segment of the TransAmerica Corridor (Future I-66) extending from KY 80 east of Somerset, to I-75 near London, Kentucky. When completed, I-66 will improve accessibility throughout southern Kentucky to jobs, industry, urban centers, educational facilities, tourism and recreational facilities.
5. US 93 corridor - Montana. The Montana US 93 corridor is roughly 288 miles long and approximately 26-30 projects are at various stages of development throughout its length. The project is important to the transportation needs of the northern Rocky Mountain region.
6. Philadelphia International Airport Improvements - Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. This project consists of major airfield improvements at Philadelphia International Airport (PHL) through the construction of new runways and related taxiways. PHL is a major east coast airport and has substantial capacity needs. To accommodate those capacity needs, the airport proposes to add a runway.
7. Interstate 69 (I-69) Corridor - Texas. This is a major grouping of projects - on the entire length of I-69 in Texas, representing 13 Environmental Impact Statements based on a FHWA decision to break I-69 Texas Corridor into 13 Segments of Independent Utility (SIU). Despite a high level of coordination and cooperation to date, the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) is concerned about Federal agency future positions on pre-NEPA decisions and on how to address cumulative and indirect environmental impacts.
8. Trinity River Parkway - Texas. The Trinity Parkway project is a new ten-mile road along the Trinity River corridor. The purpose of the project is to relieve serious congestion on I-35, I-30, and other major transportation facilities in the Dallas-Fort Worth area.
Trinity River Parkway - Dallas, Texas
The Trinity Parkway project is a proposed ten-mile, six-lane, controlled-access toll road along the Trinity River corridor. The purpose of the project is to relieve serious congestion on I-35, I-30, and other major transportation facilities in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. Various alignments are being considered for the Parkway, which would include 10 miles of roadway, one main lane toll plaza, 14 ramp toll plazas, and multiple interchanges. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is also conducting a study of potential multipurpose projects in the immediate vicinity of the proposed Parkway, including ecosystem restoration, flood damage reduction, and recreation development. The Army Corps of Engineers and the North Texas Toll Authority, the sponsors of the Trinity Parkway project, are coordinating their studies.
For more information, please visit the project website.
President Bush issued Executive Order 13274 on September 18, 2002 to enhance environmental stewardship and streamline the decision-making process in connection with major transportation projects. Visit the Environmental Stewardship and Transportation Infrastructure Project Reviews web site to find out more about the implementation of Executive Order 13274.
Department of Transportation Priority Project List
1. Interstate 5 North Coast - California. The I-5 North Coast Project will construct additional general-purpose lanes, a HOV/Managed Lane facility, and operational improvements on I-5 from San Diego to Oceanside. In addition to those 26 miles of improvements, the project also will include a two-mile segment of Interstate 805 in San Diego.
2. Route 11 Extension - Connecticut. This project will complete the Route 11 freeway, a distance of 8.5 miles. The project will extend the freeway from Salem to Interstate 95 in East Lyme/Waterford. The construction of Route 11 started in the 1970s, but a lack of funding prevented its completion. The project was reinitiated in 1997.
3. US Route 411 Connector - Georgia. The purpose of the proposed US 411 Connector is to improve connectivity by providing a more direct link between US 411 and I-75. The project will separate through traffic from locally generated traffic, reducing congestion in the corridor. US 411 is a critical link in Georgia's portion of the Atlanta to Memphis Highway.
4. Interstate Highway 66 - Kentucky. The proposed project is a segment of the TransAmerica Corridor (Future I-66) extending from KY 80 east of Somerset, to I-75 near London, Kentucky. When completed, I-66 will improve accessibility throughout southern Kentucky to jobs, industry, urban centers, educational facilities, tourism and recreational facilities.
5. US 93 corridor - Montana. The Montana US 93 corridor is roughly 288 miles long and approximately 26-30 projects are at various stages of development throughout its length. The project is important to the transportation needs of the northern Rocky Mountain region.
6. Philadelphia International Airport Improvements - Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. This project consists of major airfield improvements at Philadelphia International Airport (PHL) through the construction of new runways and related taxiways. PHL is a major east coast airport and has substantial capacity needs. To accommodate those capacity needs, the airport proposes to add a runway.
7. Interstate 69 (I-69) Corridor - Texas. This is a major grouping of projects - on the entire length of I-69 in Texas, representing 13 Environmental Impact Statements based on a FHWA decision to break I-69 Texas Corridor into 13 Segments of Independent Utility (SIU). Despite a high level of coordination and cooperation to date, the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) is concerned about Federal agency future positions on pre-NEPA decisions and on how to address cumulative and indirect environmental impacts.
8. Trinity River Parkway - Texas. The Trinity Parkway project is a new ten-mile road along the Trinity River corridor. The purpose of the project is to relieve serious congestion on I-35, I-30, and other major transportation facilities in the Dallas-Fort Worth area.
Trinity River Parkway - Dallas, Texas
The Trinity Parkway project is a proposed ten-mile, six-lane, controlled-access toll road along the Trinity River corridor. The purpose of the project is to relieve serious congestion on I-35, I-30, and other major transportation facilities in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. Various alignments are being considered for the Parkway, which would include 10 miles of roadway, one main lane toll plaza, 14 ramp toll plazas, and multiple interchanges. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is also conducting a study of potential multipurpose projects in the immediate vicinity of the proposed Parkway, including ecosystem restoration, flood damage reduction, and recreation development. The Army Corps of Engineers and the North Texas Toll Authority, the sponsors of the Trinity Parkway project, are coordinating their studies.
For more information, please visit the project website.
Thursday, August 16, 2007
Mirror, Mirror - To see who's behind the bridge collapse, just take a look - Jim Schutze writes about earmarks, pork and other things
By Jim Schutze - The Dallas Observer - Published: August 16, 2007
Sunday, August 12, 2007
In '98 bond vote, backers referred to Trinity toll road - Documents contradict claims of toll road 'bait and switch'
By BRUCE TOMASO - The Dallas Morning News - Sat., August 11, 2007
Opponents of the Trinity River toll road say city leaders pulled a fast one nine years ago, promising Dallas voters a beautiful downtown park and delivering a hideous highway instead.
They accuse the city of a "bait-and-switch," contending that when voters approved a 1998 bond issue for Trinity River improvements, they thought they were voting for a "parkway," a sort of Turtle Creek Boulevard by the river – while what's being planned instead is a multi-lane, high-speed freeway, something closer in concept to the Dallas North Tollway.
But a review of city and state documents, court records, news coverage and campaign materials put out by both sides in the months before the 1998 bond vote shows clearly that the city intended to build a tollway inside the levees.
Those records, thousands of pages of them, show that city officials and state transportation planners thought a major reliever route was needed to alleviate traffic congestion downtown and along Stemmons Freeway.
"I can tell you unequivocally and emphatically that we never, ever misrepresented the nature of what was being proposed. We were proposing a highway," said former Mayor Ron Kirk, who pushed hard for passage of the Trinity bonds in 1998.
"In everything we communicated, we made that clear to voters. And the opponents of this project know that. If they're saying otherwise, it's totally disingenuous."
Ballot language
But Dallas City Council member Angela Hunt, the driving force behind a November referendum to kill the toll road, said if anyone's being disingenuous, it's Mr. Kirk and his allies. She points again and again to the language on the May 2, 1998, ballot, which described the project only as the "Trinity Parkway and related street improvements."
"If the people who support this road are so certain that everyone understood that what was being proposed was a huge, high-speed toll road with no direct access to the park, then why in the heck wasn't that on the ballot?" Ms Hunt said.
"If what you intend to build is a high-speed toll road, to describe that to voters as a 'parkway' – there's something purposefully deceptive in that."
A lawsuit brought by environmentalists in 2000 unsuccessfully sought to halt the Trinity project on those very grounds. The suit argued that city leaders had altered the project substantially after voters approved the 1998 bond issue.
"Bait-and-switch is a perfect description," James Blackburn, the Houston lawyer who represented the environmentalists, said last week. "They called it a 'parkway' for a reason. If they had called it a toll road, it might never have been approved."
The environmentalists lost that argument, however. On Sept. 18, 2001, state District Judge Anne Ashby ruled in the city's favor, saying the bond proposition "constitutes a valid contract with the voters."
The Court of Appeals in Dallas upheld the city's position on June 6, 2002. The appellate court ruled that there was no reason a "Trinity Parkway" couldn't be a multi-lane, high-speed tollway, if that's what the City Council wanted to build.
"There is nothing in the language of the proposition that defines the specific number of lanes, speed limit, or configuration," the appellate court wrote. "Rather, specific parameters are not included, most likely so that the city would have the needed discretion to define the specific roadway as all the component parts come together."
In addition to the road, the $246 million bond package called for construction of a downtown park with lakes; flood-control improvements; acquisition of hardwood bottomlands south of downtown in the Great Trinity Forest; and other recreational amenities.
Ms. Hunt said that today, as she goes around talking to voters, "when I say, 'Do you know they're building a toll road where we're supposed to have our downtown park?' they look at me in disbelief. They look at me and say, 'What are you talking about? That's the dumbest idea I've ever heard.' "
Voters may indeed decide this fall that building the Trinity toll road is a dumb idea. And many of them thought it was a dumb idea nine years ago.
The Trinity bonds were narrowly approved – by fewer than 2,400 votes. Ten other bond proposals – for things like parks and playgrounds, a new police headquarters, a fire station, libraries and an animal shelter – won overwhelming public support.
"One of the major points of public debate back in 1998 was the toll road," said Craig Holcomb, the former Dallas City Council member who supported the bond issue and who now leads the group opposing Ms. Hunt's referendum.
"People who voted against the Trinity bonds weren't opposed to the Great Trinity Forest. They weren't opposed to an equestrian center. The controversy was about the toll road."
The list of documents that identified the Trinity Parkway as a planned toll road before the May bond vote is a lengthy one:
•The city printed 20,000 booklets (5,000 in Spanish, 15,000 in English) to distribute to voters in advance of the election. The 18-page booklet summarized all the propositions on the ballot. The summary of Proposition 11, the one to authorize the Trinity bonds, described the proposed Trinity Parkway as "a 6-8 lane reliever route" and said: "This project is under consideration by the North Texas Tollway Authority for development as a toll facility."
•On Nov. 5, 1997, the City Council was briefed on "Trinity Corridor Transportation Improvements." Printed materials for that briefing discussed options for speeding up construction of the Trinity Parkway by building it "as a toll facility."
•In the weeks leading up to the election, supporters of the bond issue mailed out slick color brochures to about 75,000 households, urging voters to approve the bonds. The brochures could not have portrayed the Trinity project in more glowing terms. They included watercolor drawings of sailboats on the downtown lake, a bubbling fountain, bicyclists, street vendors, a couple in a canoe. (There is nothing in the drawings that looks anything like a highway.) The brochures likened the Trinity project to "San Antonio's bustling Riverwalk ... New York's beautiful Central Park ... Austin's scenic Town Lake."
Yet, even this exuberantly flattering brochure made it clear to anyone who read the text that "a system of tollroads" was part of the deal.
•A political ad purchased by opponents of the Trinity project was published in The Dallas Morning News on April 28, 1998, four days before the bond vote. The ad urged voters to reject the bond proposition. One reason: "Proposed eight-lane tollway inside the levee would increase pollution."
•In the 10 months preceding the 1998 bond election, there were at least 27 news stories, four editorials, two letters to the editor and two "op-ed" commentaries in The News that described the road as a toll road.
Both commentaries were written by environmentalists who opposed the Trinity project. One called the project the "mayor's exorbitant scheme" and said it included "costly, dangerous, polluting toll roads inside the levees." The other said, "The construction of an eight-lane tollway within the levee system ... isn't economically or environmentally sensible."
•Jim Schutze, a columnist for the Dallas Observer, wrote a lengthy story denouncing the Trinity project on Jan. 22, 1998 – 14 weeks before the election. Today, Mr. Schutze echoes the line of Ms. Hunt's group, TrinityVote, that what happened back in 1998 was a bait-and-switch – a phrase he used in an Aug. 2 appearance on KERA-FM (90.1). "This was presented to people as a park and lakes and sailboats," he told KERA's listeners.
But his 1998 story made it clear that he, at least, was aware that the Trinity bond proposal called for a toll road. In it, he referred to the role of the North Texas Tollway Authority ("a bunch of road hucksters hungry for work"). He described the toll road's route and how it would be built using fill dirt excavated from the riverbed. And he talked about how financing for the transportation aspect of the Trinity project was critical to the project's overall completion.
"Without the road money," he wrote, "the river plan doesn't work financially."
Mr. Schutze did not return telephone calls or e-mail messages seeking his comment for this story.
•Elsewhere, the Observer, on April 23, 1998, described the Trinity project as "a fetid, mosquito-infested lake in a treeless park bounded by expressways – all paid for with taxes."
Former Mayor Laura Miller, who succeeded Mr. Kirk in office, was running for the City Council for the first time in that same May 1998 election. (She would win and go on to represent an Oak Cliff district.)
As a candidate, she opposed the Trinity bond project.
That's because she didn't like the toll road, she said last week.
"We all knew there was a highway in the river bottom," she said. "And I didn't like anything about it, and I said so loud and clear."
In 2003, as mayor, she led an effort to revamp the toll road design, making it more environmentally sensitive. The new design, unanimously adopted by the City Council that December, reduced the number of lanes and shifted them all to the downtown side of the river, providing unfettered access to the river park from the Oak Cliff side.
Ms. Miller, now a strong supporter of the Trinity project, said she is "frustrated and dismayed" by the current efforts of Ms. Hunt and her supporters to undo that work.
Agency study
Those who accuse the city of a bait-and-switch often point to a March 1998 study by the Texas Department of Transportation, the "Trinity Parkway Corridor Major Transportation Investment Study." That thick document offers a comprehensive look at the city's downtown traffic woes and transportation needs.
That study does describe the proposed Trinity Parkway as something akin to what Ms. Hunt's group has in mind – "a lower speed parkway design rather than a freeway design," with a posted speed limit of 45 mph. (Her referendum would limit any road inside the levees to two lanes in each direction and a speed limit of 35 mph.)
However, on the next page, the study said: "Some or all of the Trinity Parkway reliever route could be constructed using toll funding" – a decision, in fact, that the city had already made by March 1998.
And if that happened, the study said, "some design changes could be necessary," meaning the road would have to be built as a high-speed, multi-lane freeway, to move more cars more quickly.
"No one is going to pay a toll to drive 35 miles an hour," Paul Wageman, chairman of the North Texas Tollway Authority, said in an interview last week.
Ms. Hunt, however, reiterated that if the city wanted to build a high-speed toll road providing little access to the park, it should have just said so.
"If that was the case, then that can be stated on the ballot," she said. "Why not be honest with people?"
Ray Hutchison, who represented the city in the 2000 lawsuit brought by Mr. Blackburn, said general, even vague, language is common in bond proposals. (Mr. Hutchison's firm, Vinson & Elkins, also employs Mr. Kirk, the former mayor.)
"You've got a lot of discretion in the issuance of bonds in how you frame the proposition," said Mr. Hutchison, a nationally recognized expert in public finance law.
"But once you frame the proposition, you're stuck with it."
He said, for example, that if the City Council issued bonds "for the improvement of Main Street between Harwood and Ervay, it couldn't turn around and use the money for repairs on Elm Street."
But if the proposition just said, "for downtown street improvements," the council would have the leeway to use the money where it saw fit.
In the case of the Trinity Parkway, he said, the proposition intentionally said nothing about what sort of road should be built. "That is a matter for the City Council to decide."
Planning for what would become the Trinity River project began in 1996. In the summer of that year, Mr. Kirk hosted a summit of state, local and federal officials to discuss improvements within the river corridor. The city established a Trinity River Corridor Project Management Office. Its first director was appointed in January 1997.
By mid-1997, the city was evaluating a comprehensive, $1 billion plan, devised by the Texas Department of Transportation, to address downtown traffic woes.
One element of that plan: the nine- to 10-mile-long Trinity Parkway.
As early as that summer, there were public discussions of building that parkway as a toll road.
The main advantage of that approach, Dallas city officials were told, was that a toll road could get financed much more quickly, shaving years off the completion schedule.
With conventional funding, collected in the form of gasoline taxes and dribbled out annually by the state, design and construction of the road was expected to take at least 13 years – and probably longer. Dallas would stand in line, along with other Texas cities, for a share of that highway money.
But as a toll road, where the tolls paid by motorists help pay back construction costs, the Trinity parkway could be built in as little as eight to 10 years, state officials said.
"We're going to have to look at a toll road. It may be the key to getting things going along the Trinity," Alan Walne, then a Dallas City Council member, said at a council meeting on Aug. 20, 1997. Three weeks later, the council unanimously endorsed the state plan, including the Trinity toll road.
Although a formal contract between the city and the North Texas Tollway Authority regarding financing of the road wasn't finalized until January 1999, in principle, the City Council had agreed by the fall of 1997: The Trinity Parkway would be a toll road. That would necessarily mean a higher speed, and more lanes, and less direct access to the park than what many environmentalists wanted.
From then on, a high-speed toll road "was always intended to be a key, integral piece" of the downtown traffic solution, said Timothy Nesbitt, a project manager in the Dallas district of the Texas Department of Transportation.
"To claim, 'We didn't know about it, you disguised it' – it was never disguised."A color brochure that Trinity bond supporters mailed to voters in the spring of 1998 showed sailboats, blue skies, a green park ... but no highway or cars in the park. The text of the brochure, however, mentioned that the project included "a system of tollroads." A March 1998 report from the Texas Department of Transportation (above right) described the proposed Trinity Parkway as a low-speed road, but added "some design changes could be necessary" if it were built as a toll road instead.
Newspaper ads taken out by opponents of the 1998 Trinity bond proposal show they knew what they were fighting against: an "eight-lane tollway inside the levee."
But the ballot language for the bond proposal described the planned road only as "the Trinity Parkway." Critics contend that this was misleading, particularly because city officials already knew they were considering a high-speed, multi-lane toll road.
Read more in the Dallas Morning News
Opponents of the Trinity River toll road say city leaders pulled a fast one nine years ago, promising Dallas voters a beautiful downtown park and delivering a hideous highway instead.
They accuse the city of a "bait-and-switch," contending that when voters approved a 1998 bond issue for Trinity River improvements, they thought they were voting for a "parkway," a sort of Turtle Creek Boulevard by the river – while what's being planned instead is a multi-lane, high-speed freeway, something closer in concept to the Dallas North Tollway.
But a review of city and state documents, court records, news coverage and campaign materials put out by both sides in the months before the 1998 bond vote shows clearly that the city intended to build a tollway inside the levees.
Those records, thousands of pages of them, show that city officials and state transportation planners thought a major reliever route was needed to alleviate traffic congestion downtown and along Stemmons Freeway.
"I can tell you unequivocally and emphatically that we never, ever misrepresented the nature of what was being proposed. We were proposing a highway," said former Mayor Ron Kirk, who pushed hard for passage of the Trinity bonds in 1998.
"In everything we communicated, we made that clear to voters. And the opponents of this project know that. If they're saying otherwise, it's totally disingenuous."
Ballot language
But Dallas City Council member Angela Hunt, the driving force behind a November referendum to kill the toll road, said if anyone's being disingenuous, it's Mr. Kirk and his allies. She points again and again to the language on the May 2, 1998, ballot, which described the project only as the "Trinity Parkway and related street improvements."
"If the people who support this road are so certain that everyone understood that what was being proposed was a huge, high-speed toll road with no direct access to the park, then why in the heck wasn't that on the ballot?" Ms Hunt said.
"If what you intend to build is a high-speed toll road, to describe that to voters as a 'parkway' – there's something purposefully deceptive in that."
A lawsuit brought by environmentalists in 2000 unsuccessfully sought to halt the Trinity project on those very grounds. The suit argued that city leaders had altered the project substantially after voters approved the 1998 bond issue.
"Bait-and-switch is a perfect description," James Blackburn, the Houston lawyer who represented the environmentalists, said last week. "They called it a 'parkway' for a reason. If they had called it a toll road, it might never have been approved."
The environmentalists lost that argument, however. On Sept. 18, 2001, state District Judge Anne Ashby ruled in the city's favor, saying the bond proposition "constitutes a valid contract with the voters."
The Court of Appeals in Dallas upheld the city's position on June 6, 2002. The appellate court ruled that there was no reason a "Trinity Parkway" couldn't be a multi-lane, high-speed tollway, if that's what the City Council wanted to build.
"There is nothing in the language of the proposition that defines the specific number of lanes, speed limit, or configuration," the appellate court wrote. "Rather, specific parameters are not included, most likely so that the city would have the needed discretion to define the specific roadway as all the component parts come together."
In addition to the road, the $246 million bond package called for construction of a downtown park with lakes; flood-control improvements; acquisition of hardwood bottomlands south of downtown in the Great Trinity Forest; and other recreational amenities.
Ms. Hunt said that today, as she goes around talking to voters, "when I say, 'Do you know they're building a toll road where we're supposed to have our downtown park?' they look at me in disbelief. They look at me and say, 'What are you talking about? That's the dumbest idea I've ever heard.' "
Voters may indeed decide this fall that building the Trinity toll road is a dumb idea. And many of them thought it was a dumb idea nine years ago.
The Trinity bonds were narrowly approved – by fewer than 2,400 votes. Ten other bond proposals – for things like parks and playgrounds, a new police headquarters, a fire station, libraries and an animal shelter – won overwhelming public support.
"One of the major points of public debate back in 1998 was the toll road," said Craig Holcomb, the former Dallas City Council member who supported the bond issue and who now leads the group opposing Ms. Hunt's referendum.
"People who voted against the Trinity bonds weren't opposed to the Great Trinity Forest. They weren't opposed to an equestrian center. The controversy was about the toll road."
The list of documents that identified the Trinity Parkway as a planned toll road before the May bond vote is a lengthy one:
•The city printed 20,000 booklets (5,000 in Spanish, 15,000 in English) to distribute to voters in advance of the election. The 18-page booklet summarized all the propositions on the ballot. The summary of Proposition 11, the one to authorize the Trinity bonds, described the proposed Trinity Parkway as "a 6-8 lane reliever route" and said: "This project is under consideration by the North Texas Tollway Authority for development as a toll facility."
•On Nov. 5, 1997, the City Council was briefed on "Trinity Corridor Transportation Improvements." Printed materials for that briefing discussed options for speeding up construction of the Trinity Parkway by building it "as a toll facility."
•In the weeks leading up to the election, supporters of the bond issue mailed out slick color brochures to about 75,000 households, urging voters to approve the bonds. The brochures could not have portrayed the Trinity project in more glowing terms. They included watercolor drawings of sailboats on the downtown lake, a bubbling fountain, bicyclists, street vendors, a couple in a canoe. (There is nothing in the drawings that looks anything like a highway.) The brochures likened the Trinity project to "San Antonio's bustling Riverwalk ... New York's beautiful Central Park ... Austin's scenic Town Lake."
Yet, even this exuberantly flattering brochure made it clear to anyone who read the text that "a system of tollroads" was part of the deal.
•A political ad purchased by opponents of the Trinity project was published in The Dallas Morning News on April 28, 1998, four days before the bond vote. The ad urged voters to reject the bond proposition. One reason: "Proposed eight-lane tollway inside the levee would increase pollution."
•In the 10 months preceding the 1998 bond election, there were at least 27 news stories, four editorials, two letters to the editor and two "op-ed" commentaries in The News that described the road as a toll road.
Both commentaries were written by environmentalists who opposed the Trinity project. One called the project the "mayor's exorbitant scheme" and said it included "costly, dangerous, polluting toll roads inside the levees." The other said, "The construction of an eight-lane tollway within the levee system ... isn't economically or environmentally sensible."
•Jim Schutze, a columnist for the Dallas Observer, wrote a lengthy story denouncing the Trinity project on Jan. 22, 1998 – 14 weeks before the election. Today, Mr. Schutze echoes the line of Ms. Hunt's group, TrinityVote, that what happened back in 1998 was a bait-and-switch – a phrase he used in an Aug. 2 appearance on KERA-FM (90.1). "This was presented to people as a park and lakes and sailboats," he told KERA's listeners.
But his 1998 story made it clear that he, at least, was aware that the Trinity bond proposal called for a toll road. In it, he referred to the role of the North Texas Tollway Authority ("a bunch of road hucksters hungry for work"). He described the toll road's route and how it would be built using fill dirt excavated from the riverbed. And he talked about how financing for the transportation aspect of the Trinity project was critical to the project's overall completion.
"Without the road money," he wrote, "the river plan doesn't work financially."
Mr. Schutze did not return telephone calls or e-mail messages seeking his comment for this story.
•Elsewhere, the Observer, on April 23, 1998, described the Trinity project as "a fetid, mosquito-infested lake in a treeless park bounded by expressways – all paid for with taxes."
Former Mayor Laura Miller, who succeeded Mr. Kirk in office, was running for the City Council for the first time in that same May 1998 election. (She would win and go on to represent an Oak Cliff district.)
As a candidate, she opposed the Trinity bond project.
That's because she didn't like the toll road, she said last week.
"We all knew there was a highway in the river bottom," she said. "And I didn't like anything about it, and I said so loud and clear."
In 2003, as mayor, she led an effort to revamp the toll road design, making it more environmentally sensitive. The new design, unanimously adopted by the City Council that December, reduced the number of lanes and shifted them all to the downtown side of the river, providing unfettered access to the river park from the Oak Cliff side.
Ms. Miller, now a strong supporter of the Trinity project, said she is "frustrated and dismayed" by the current efforts of Ms. Hunt and her supporters to undo that work.
Agency study
Those who accuse the city of a bait-and-switch often point to a March 1998 study by the Texas Department of Transportation, the "Trinity Parkway Corridor Major Transportation Investment Study." That thick document offers a comprehensive look at the city's downtown traffic woes and transportation needs.
That study does describe the proposed Trinity Parkway as something akin to what Ms. Hunt's group has in mind – "a lower speed parkway design rather than a freeway design," with a posted speed limit of 45 mph. (Her referendum would limit any road inside the levees to two lanes in each direction and a speed limit of 35 mph.)
However, on the next page, the study said: "Some or all of the Trinity Parkway reliever route could be constructed using toll funding" – a decision, in fact, that the city had already made by March 1998.
And if that happened, the study said, "some design changes could be necessary," meaning the road would have to be built as a high-speed, multi-lane freeway, to move more cars more quickly.
"No one is going to pay a toll to drive 35 miles an hour," Paul Wageman, chairman of the North Texas Tollway Authority, said in an interview last week.
Ms. Hunt, however, reiterated that if the city wanted to build a high-speed toll road providing little access to the park, it should have just said so.
"If that was the case, then that can be stated on the ballot," she said. "Why not be honest with people?"
Ray Hutchison, who represented the city in the 2000 lawsuit brought by Mr. Blackburn, said general, even vague, language is common in bond proposals. (Mr. Hutchison's firm, Vinson & Elkins, also employs Mr. Kirk, the former mayor.)
"You've got a lot of discretion in the issuance of bonds in how you frame the proposition," said Mr. Hutchison, a nationally recognized expert in public finance law.
"But once you frame the proposition, you're stuck with it."
He said, for example, that if the City Council issued bonds "for the improvement of Main Street between Harwood and Ervay, it couldn't turn around and use the money for repairs on Elm Street."
But if the proposition just said, "for downtown street improvements," the council would have the leeway to use the money where it saw fit.
In the case of the Trinity Parkway, he said, the proposition intentionally said nothing about what sort of road should be built. "That is a matter for the City Council to decide."
Planning for what would become the Trinity River project began in 1996. In the summer of that year, Mr. Kirk hosted a summit of state, local and federal officials to discuss improvements within the river corridor. The city established a Trinity River Corridor Project Management Office. Its first director was appointed in January 1997.
By mid-1997, the city was evaluating a comprehensive, $1 billion plan, devised by the Texas Department of Transportation, to address downtown traffic woes.
One element of that plan: the nine- to 10-mile-long Trinity Parkway.
As early as that summer, there were public discussions of building that parkway as a toll road.
The main advantage of that approach, Dallas city officials were told, was that a toll road could get financed much more quickly, shaving years off the completion schedule.
With conventional funding, collected in the form of gasoline taxes and dribbled out annually by the state, design and construction of the road was expected to take at least 13 years – and probably longer. Dallas would stand in line, along with other Texas cities, for a share of that highway money.
But as a toll road, where the tolls paid by motorists help pay back construction costs, the Trinity parkway could be built in as little as eight to 10 years, state officials said.
"We're going to have to look at a toll road. It may be the key to getting things going along the Trinity," Alan Walne, then a Dallas City Council member, said at a council meeting on Aug. 20, 1997. Three weeks later, the council unanimously endorsed the state plan, including the Trinity toll road.
Although a formal contract between the city and the North Texas Tollway Authority regarding financing of the road wasn't finalized until January 1999, in principle, the City Council had agreed by the fall of 1997: The Trinity Parkway would be a toll road. That would necessarily mean a higher speed, and more lanes, and less direct access to the park than what many environmentalists wanted.
From then on, a high-speed toll road "was always intended to be a key, integral piece" of the downtown traffic solution, said Timothy Nesbitt, a project manager in the Dallas district of the Texas Department of Transportation.
"To claim, 'We didn't know about it, you disguised it' – it was never disguised."A color brochure that Trinity bond supporters mailed to voters in the spring of 1998 showed sailboats, blue skies, a green park ... but no highway or cars in the park. The text of the brochure, however, mentioned that the project included "a system of tollroads." A March 1998 report from the Texas Department of Transportation (above right) described the proposed Trinity Parkway as a low-speed road, but added "some design changes could be necessary" if it were built as a toll road instead.
Newspaper ads taken out by opponents of the 1998 Trinity bond proposal show they knew what they were fighting against: an "eight-lane tollway inside the levee."
But the ballot language for the bond proposal described the planned road only as "the Trinity Parkway." Critics contend that this was misleading, particularly because city officials already knew they were considering a high-speed, multi-lane toll road.
Read more in the Dallas Morning News
Monday, July 30, 2007
Friday, June 29, 2007
Trinity toll road opponents force a vote
By BRUCE TOMASO - The Dallas Morning News - Friday, June 29, 2007
Supporters of a referendum in Dallas to scuttle the Trinity River toll road said Friday that they have enough signatures to force a November vote.
They turned in what they said are more than 48,000 signatures of registered Dallas voters by Friday’s deadline. If enough of those signatures are verified as valid by the city secretary’s office, a measure to remove the proposed toll road from the Trinity River corridor will go before voters in the fall.
City Council member Angela Hunt headed the effort to put the matter before Dallas voters. She and her group, TrinityVote, contend that the toll road should be scrapped because it will detract from a proposed downtown river park. They say that when Dallas voters approved $246 million in bonds for the Trinity River Corridor Project in 1998, many thought they were voting for a low-speed parkway, not a high-speed, multi-lane toll road.
See more Trinity Toll Road/ Trinity Parkway stories on WFAA
Supporters of the road say it's needed to alleviate downtown congestion, and that removing it now from the plans could delay work on other aspects of the Trinity project, including the park and flood-control improvements.
Supporters of a referendum in Dallas to scuttle the Trinity River toll road said Friday that they have enough signatures to force a November vote.
They turned in what they said are more than 48,000 signatures of registered Dallas voters by Friday’s deadline. If enough of those signatures are verified as valid by the city secretary’s office, a measure to remove the proposed toll road from the Trinity River corridor will go before voters in the fall.
City Council member Angela Hunt headed the effort to put the matter before Dallas voters. She and her group, TrinityVote, contend that the toll road should be scrapped because it will detract from a proposed downtown river park. They say that when Dallas voters approved $246 million in bonds for the Trinity River Corridor Project in 1998, many thought they were voting for a low-speed parkway, not a high-speed, multi-lane toll road.
See more Trinity Toll Road/ Trinity Parkway stories on WFAA
Supporters of the road say it's needed to alleviate downtown congestion, and that removing it now from the plans could delay work on other aspects of the Trinity project, including the park and flood-control improvements.
Thursday, June 7, 2007
Eminent Domain, lies, manipulation and deceit on both forks of the Trinity
Jim Schutze of the Dallas Observer calls D Magazine publisher Wick Allison on distortation of "facts" (Trinity Toll/Park project)
Ed Oakley mutters against bothersome property rights in Dallas City Council;
Citizens face elected officials on both sides of the Trinity over eminent domain and property rights
By Faith Chatham - June 8, 2007
The saga in Dallas continues between media moguls, (DMN and D Magazine publisher Wick Allison, City Council person Angela Hunt and Dallas Observer columnist Jim Schutze. Biased coverage of the political scene is nothing new in big city journalism, but DMN under BELO's coverage of toll roads and transportation frequently seems to translate it into a new art form.
For a couple of weeks I've been posting articles on the Trinity Park-- er Tollway -- with sparring between opponents and proponents of the Trinity Toll Way. Trinity Vote has attempted to clarify the facts.
This week Jim Schutze's column (My Brain on Crack - Wick Allison, The Trinity Park Project. Have I gone mad?)
Irritated with coverage which he's termed "fiction" rather than "fact", columnist Jim Schutze ripped the facade off of the DMN's editorial a few weeks ago. City Council woman Angela Hunt took her speaking tour on the road and penned an open letter to Wick Allison to set the record straight. A soft-spoken very articulate lady with a Mission, Council Woman Hunt is upset that the project described to the citizens before they were asked to vote on the bonds for Trinity Park is vastly different now than what the citizens approved. She's (along thousands of other registered voters who have signed the Trinity Vote petition) are demanding that the Toll Road be taken back before the voters before ground is broken. Hunt outlines the differences between what the citizens were told prior to the bond election and what the City of Dallas, TxDOT, the RTC of the NCTCOG and other planners plan to deliver with those precious bond dollars which get paid by hard-earned dollars out of citizens’ pockets plans to actually build. The Belmont Debate between Councilwoman Hunt and Craig Holcomb has made it onto YOU TUBE VIDEO)
Numerous decades old DMN news stories and public meeting descriptors of Trinity Park with its PARKWAY, described as a 'low speed 45 mile and hour parkway with numerous entrances in to the park' have surfaced recently. Big dollars backers of the Toll Road (Trinity Commons Foundation) have been on the speaker’s circuit, trying to strike fear into the public about flood control and potential loss of Federal flood control dollars if the Toll Road proposal is killed. Jim Schutze came out with his computer keys blazing over that one. He quoted U.S. Congresswoman Eddie Bernice Johnson who fought hard for those flood control dollars and clarified for the Dallas Observer readers that there the flood control dollars remain for flood control whether any road ever gets built in or near or through the Trinity flood plane near downtown Dallas! Amid charges (and a YOU TUBE VIDEO of what some allege are "paid educational consultants" who functioned as political operatives during the May 12th City of Dallas elections to interfere with the petition drive to collect signatures calling for a referendum on the Trinity Toll Way, and charges that they were employed by the non-profit Trinity Commons Foundation promoting the Toll Way, and rumbles about possible lawsuits and/or charges for violations of election law, the plot thickened in Dallas and the soup smelled worse than the stagnant sediment ponds cropping up in Wise County and other places where injection gas drilling is changing the landscape. Schutze referred to "Laura's goons" in earlier columns.
Angela Hunt earned accolades from Schutze in the spring for detailed research and for saving reporters from boredom at meetings of Dallas City Council Trinity River Committee.This week's Jim has devoted his column to taking DMagazine publisher Wick Allison to task. I'm including excerpts here but urge you to read it in its entirety.
Jim Schutze is one of the best columnists in this area. He's consistently refused to cave to pressure by publishers or peers to water down his rhetoric or avoid topics which fly counter to the financial interests of the high and powerful, politically ambitious, or his own publishers (which has changed over the years, probably due to his refusal to sell out his journalist integrity to satisfy the corporate board room.
Schutze writes:
I'm a big advocate of following the money. Schutze lays out the Trinity Park -er Toll Way? Project shortfall.
Tarrant County citizens are up in arms over Tarrant County Judge Glen Whitley, Whitley, a board member on NASCO, an international non-profit organization based in Dallas with a stated mission to develop interstate international super transportation corridors to speed up shipment of freight from ports in Mexico through Texas to Kansas City and Canada), fervently lobbied the Texas Legislature to exclude the DFW region from the 2 year moratorium on toll roads. Now Whitley is trying to persuade the Tarrant County Commissioners Court that it is wise for them to sign a letter urging Governor Perry to veto HB 2006 - a bill which curtains some of the dubious practices enacted in the previous session of the Legislature in TTC empowering legislation (promoted by NASCO!). Arlington school teacher Linda Lancaster showed up at Tarrant County Commissioners Court Tuesday (6-5) and said her piece. They delayed voting on signing the letter until next week. Hopefully many others will show up at 10:30 a.m. Tuesday the 12th and remind those folks that the powerbrokers who met in Fort Worth last week with NASCO are not the people who voted them into office and can vote them out!
The Dallas Observer readers also weigh in this week (published June 7, 2007) on Eminent Domain. Kudos to Fort Worth Star-Telegram political reporter Anna Tinsley for alerting readers to Whitley's attempt to undermine the citizens of Tarrant County to the detriment of landowners all over Texas.
Pirates of the Council |Hardee Har |Past Tense |And Finally Pirates of the Council and subtitled: The Pixies, The Police, Dallas comics, property rights ,
Jim Schutze's column (published May 31, 2007) The Good Laura, Or, how Bill Blaydes locked up the Bastard of the Year award
The saga moves to the City Council chamber:
Oakley, a City Hall apologist who has replaced Laura Miller as the city's point person working with Trinity Commons Foundation to get the big high speed Toll Road built through the what the voters voted to fund as a Park, is not high on the list of many of his former supporters. His opponent in the Dallas's Mayoral runoff also favors building the Parkway, but as an outsider, Tom Leppert seems less offensive when he discusses it than does insider Ed Oakley. Oakley, who represents a district in the southern quadrant of the city, should be concerned for the property rights of the little guy, but seems to spout the Corporate, big developer, big dollar interest line more than adhering to a more populist Democratic line. The Dallas County Democratic Party made an unprecedented move in endorsing a candidate in what is normally a nonpartisan city race, yet many of the Democratic activists I know are less than enthusiastic about the prospects of having Mr. Oakley as Mayor. Objections do not seem to relate to his openly gay lifestyle but to his conduct in rubbing elbows with the rich and powerful and failure to champion the plight of the little man in eminent domain squabbles and other issues when John Q Citizen must face off against the City of Dallas.
In previous column's Schutze has chided DMN reporter Steve Blow for superficial coverage of City Council and the Trinity Toll /Park Project in particular.
Today, as our fledging group of activists (DFW REGIONAL CONCERNED CITIZENS) trot down to the NCTCOG offices on Six Flags Drive in Arlington to tell the RTC and NCTCOG staff how their policies disturb us, it is encouraging to open my e-mail box and find Jim Schutze's column. Schutze can make dead serious squabbles entertaining. The Texas Legislature has scattered and I'm left to summer re-runs on television. Honestly, video links to Texas Senate Transportation Hearings and battles on the Texas House Floor as representative after representative asked Speaker Craddick to vacate the chair provided much more entertainment to me this Spring than slick news entertainment journals on network TV. (For me, one of the definite pluses to watching the Texas House and Senate via internet is that they don't cover Anna Nicole, any of her offspring or relatives or alleged paramours!)
Maybe it's those early bedside stories read to me as a child about knights and the round table and crusaders rescuing the underdog from the wicked, selfish despot that are rekindled when I watch Angela Hunt and Jim Schutze take on Trinity Commons, big corporate donors and Dallas City Hall. Whatever it is, I'm gratified that the Dallas Observer fights the giant with their feather.
In Fort Worth, Mayor Mike Moncrief (dubbed by the Fort Worth Weekly as the "GASFATHER" for his facilitation of the drilling of hundreds of gas wells in the densely populated cowtown,( and Fort Worth City Council members voted to send a letter to Perry urging veto of HB 2006 (restoring protection to landowners from seizure of property through eminent domain for private commercial development. Decades of property rights were bartered away by legislators in the 78th and 79th session of the Texas Legislature by massive changes to the Texas Transportation Code and eminent domain laws were enacted by state representatives and state senators who had accepted substantial campaign contributions from pro-toll road proponents. Speaker Craddick and Lt. Governor David Dewhurst moved the bills at rapid speed through their branches of the house. (Craddick, Dewhurst, Perry, Abbott, and Susan Combs all accepted campaign donations from Zachry Construction and Zachry family members. A significant correlation emerged between Democratic and Republican incumbents who accepted Zachry and other toll road proponents campaign contributions and their roles in sponsoring, voting for and moving TTC/CDA enabling legislation through both houses of the Texas Legislature. Public outcry against the taking of hundreds of thousands of acres of Texans unified grassroots activist in both parties to descend upon Austin. This past legislative session several folks who were instrumental in getting these bills passed stood and appeared to repent. (Steve Odgen, Florence Sharpio and others). When it was time to vote, however, Odgen's "Come to Jesus" contrition evaporated and he voted for Perry's detested "market valuation language" which many think negates the two year moratorium on CDA toll roads for most of the state.
It's been a busy season. Keeping up with who's pulling what and how the truth is twisted to give an illusion but the citizens are left holding lots of debt, empty promises, and developers, politicians, and engineering firms and highway contractors sit licking their lips with cream all over their greedy mouths seems to surpass the energy it must have required British Royalty to keep up with the palace intrigues in centuries past. We may be "tilting at windmills" but with citizens' access to the internet and writers like Jim Schutze of the Dallas Observer and Jeff Prince of the Fort Worth Weekly maybe enough voters will wake up and realize that Judge Glen Whitley, Mayor Mike Moncrief and most of the City Council and County Commissioners in the DFW Region have conspired to fleece them of property and to double tax them for use of public infrastructure! Hammering on computer keys helps, but ultimately it is the voter's responsibility to evaluate whether local officials are truly looking out for citizens' welfare. Pushing that button or marking that little box in the election booth is ultimately the only way we can depose folks who misuse their office to lobby to ensure that the rich and powerful get richer and richer and the honest working folks forfeit property and political privilege to the dark room schemes of scum bags who think that the TTC is good for Texas!
Ed Oakley mutters against bothersome property rights in Dallas City Council;
Citizens face elected officials on both sides of the Trinity over eminent domain and property rights
By Faith Chatham - June 8, 2007
The saga in Dallas continues between media moguls, (DMN and D Magazine publisher Wick Allison, City Council person Angela Hunt and Dallas Observer columnist Jim Schutze. Biased coverage of the political scene is nothing new in big city journalism, but DMN under BELO's coverage of toll roads and transportation frequently seems to translate it into a new art form.
For a couple of weeks I've been posting articles on the Trinity Park-- er Tollway -- with sparring between opponents and proponents of the Trinity Toll Way. Trinity Vote has attempted to clarify the facts.
This week Jim Schutze's column (My Brain on Crack - Wick Allison, The Trinity Park Project. Have I gone mad?)
It costs money. We have to borrow. We have to pay more taxes. It's an investment.
But look. This is also like a car deal. We went to the showroom in 1998 when we voted to let the city borrow $246 million for the Trinity River Project. We chose a fancy one—the Lexus SUV with the leather and the mag wheels and the two DVD players and the GPS navigation.
Now it's eight years later. They're trying to get us to take this Ford Escape with steel rims, cloth seats, a cheap portable CD player with earbuds and a map of Texas in the glove box. And the contract says we could owe them a billion dollars.
Irritated with coverage which he's termed "fiction" rather than "fact", columnist Jim Schutze ripped the facade off of the DMN's editorial a few weeks ago. City Council woman Angela Hunt took her speaking tour on the road and penned an open letter to Wick Allison to set the record straight. A soft-spoken very articulate lady with a Mission, Council Woman Hunt is upset that the project described to the citizens before they were asked to vote on the bonds for Trinity Park is vastly different now than what the citizens approved. She's (along thousands of other registered voters who have signed the Trinity Vote petition) are demanding that the Toll Road be taken back before the voters before ground is broken. Hunt outlines the differences between what the citizens were told prior to the bond election and what the City of Dallas, TxDOT, the RTC of the NCTCOG and other planners plan to deliver with those precious bond dollars which get paid by hard-earned dollars out of citizens’ pockets plans to actually build. The Belmont Debate between Councilwoman Hunt and Craig Holcomb has made it onto YOU TUBE VIDEO)
Numerous decades old DMN news stories and public meeting descriptors of Trinity Park with its PARKWAY, described as a 'low speed 45 mile and hour parkway with numerous entrances in to the park' have surfaced recently. Big dollars backers of the Toll Road (Trinity Commons Foundation) have been on the speaker’s circuit, trying to strike fear into the public about flood control and potential loss of Federal flood control dollars if the Toll Road proposal is killed. Jim Schutze came out with his computer keys blazing over that one. He quoted U.S. Congresswoman Eddie Bernice Johnson who fought hard for those flood control dollars and clarified for the Dallas Observer readers that there the flood control dollars remain for flood control whether any road ever gets built in or near or through the Trinity flood plane near downtown Dallas! Amid charges (and a YOU TUBE VIDEO of what some allege are "paid educational consultants" who functioned as political operatives during the May 12th City of Dallas elections to interfere with the petition drive to collect signatures calling for a referendum on the Trinity Toll Way, and charges that they were employed by the non-profit Trinity Commons Foundation promoting the Toll Way, and rumbles about possible lawsuits and/or charges for violations of election law, the plot thickened in Dallas and the soup smelled worse than the stagnant sediment ponds cropping up in Wise County and other places where injection gas drilling is changing the landscape. Schutze referred to "Laura's goons" in earlier columns.
Angela Hunt earned accolades from Schutze in the spring for detailed research and for saving reporters from boredom at meetings of Dallas City Council Trinity River Committee.This week's Jim has devoted his column to taking DMagazine publisher Wick Allison to task. I'm including excerpts here but urge you to read it in its entirety.
Jim Schutze is one of the best columnists in this area. He's consistently refused to cave to pressure by publishers or peers to water down his rhetoric or avoid topics which fly counter to the financial interests of the high and powerful, politically ambitious, or his own publishers (which has changed over the years, probably due to his refusal to sell out his journalist integrity to satisfy the corporate board room.
Schutze writes:
Wick Allison, the publisher of D magazine, has devoted his entire publisher's note in the December edition to a discussion of whether Jim Schutze—that would be moi—has been telling the truth or distorting the facts about the Trinity Project. He doesn't come right out and say it, but I think his implied conclusion is that Jim Schutze smokes crack.
So first off, let me take you back to what we saw in that showroom eight years ago. Before the 1998 bond election the "We Love Dallas" bond campaign committee published a brochure showing a sailboat regatta on a lake the length of downtown with a huge fountain in the center and promenades and terraces on the downtown bank.
The brochure's promise to voters was clear and explicit: "If you've ever taken a stroll down San Antonio's Riverwalk, sat by a lake in New York's beautiful Central Park, or driven along Austin's scenic Town Lake, then you know how valuable these recreational resources are to a city...
"With absolutely no tax increase to Dallas citizens, the Trinity River Project is the key to making 21st Century Dallas a world-class city—an 8,500-acre greenbelt bursting with new business and entertainment."
I'm a big advocate of following the money. Schutze lays out the Trinity Park -er Toll Way? Project shortfall.
In response to my open records demand, Trinity Project director Rebecca Dugger provided me with numbers to show the ultimate cost of each portion of the plan as it exists now. She also gave me the amounts available from the 1998 bonds and all of the money that has been found from other sources to help pay for the project.
I put all this in a simple spreadsheet and figured the shortfalls. Let me just give you some highlights. According to the city's own official numbers, provided to me in response to a legal demand for them, the cost for building trails alone will be $36.149 million.
Of that, the bond money will pay for $10.256 million. The city told me it had found $7.067 million from other sources. That leaves a shortfall of $18.826 million for the trails.
Look at it again. The money we approved eight years ago now only pays for 28 percent of the cost of the trails. The city has persuaded other entities to pick up an additional 20 percent. That means you and I, dear local taxpayer, are on the books for an additional 52 percent or almost 19 million bucks just for trails.
I sat at a conference table in City Hall and challenged the mayor, the city manager, Dugger and Assistant City Manager Jill Jordan to show me where my shortfalls were wrong. I gave them my spreadsheets.
Here are samples of the things they did not argue with: a $16 million shortfall to make the river curvy instead of straight; a $50 million shortfall for park roads; a $19 million shortfall for digging out the proposed lakes; a $27 million shortfall for improvements to S.M. Wright Boulevard.
To me and in public, Mayor Miller has been offering an excuse for these shortfalls that strikes me as especially dishonest. Her mantra is that everything costs more these days. It's sort of the Neiman Marcus defense: Only a cheapster would be surprised that stuff costs more than it used to.
Tarrant County citizens are up in arms over Tarrant County Judge Glen Whitley, Whitley, a board member on NASCO, an international non-profit organization based in Dallas with a stated mission to develop interstate international super transportation corridors to speed up shipment of freight from ports in Mexico through Texas to Kansas City and Canada), fervently lobbied the Texas Legislature to exclude the DFW region from the 2 year moratorium on toll roads. Now Whitley is trying to persuade the Tarrant County Commissioners Court that it is wise for them to sign a letter urging Governor Perry to veto HB 2006 - a bill which curtains some of the dubious practices enacted in the previous session of the Legislature in TTC empowering legislation (promoted by NASCO!). Arlington school teacher Linda Lancaster showed up at Tarrant County Commissioners Court Tuesday (6-5) and said her piece. They delayed voting on signing the letter until next week. Hopefully many others will show up at 10:30 a.m. Tuesday the 12th and remind those folks that the powerbrokers who met in Fort Worth last week with NASCO are not the people who voted them into office and can vote them out!
The Dallas Observer readers also weigh in this week (published June 7, 2007) on Eminent Domain. Kudos to Fort Worth Star-Telegram political reporter Anna Tinsley for alerting readers to Whitley's attempt to undermine the citizens of Tarrant County to the detriment of landowners all over Texas.
Pirates of the Council |Hardee Har |Past Tense |And Finally Pirates of the Council and subtitled: The Pixies, The Police, Dallas comics, property rights ,
Is it safe?: "The Good Laura"—perfect title for Jim Schutze's article (May 31) exposing Bill Blaydes' ruthlessness and Ed Oakley's incredible disregard for individual property rights.
Folks, they can come after your property if they can do what Blaydes with Oakley's assistance tried to do to Jack Pierce at Hollywood Overhead Doors.
Makes you wonder if it's safe to invest in Dallas anymore. Well, at least Blaydes and Oakley will be private citizens in a few weeks.
Sharon Boyd
Jim Schutze's column (published May 31, 2007) The Good Laura, Or, how Bill Blaydes locked up the Bastard of the Year award
I have to tell you this story because it's three things: 1) an appalling example of arrogance and sleaziness at City Hall, 2) a stirring example of integrity and courage at City Hall, and 3) it's about Laura Miller.
This guy owns a business that has been in his family since 1938. Since the 1950s the business has occupied a series of metal barns on nine acres down in a hollow near Walnut Hill and White Rock Trail, in a little leftover remnant of countryside swallowed up by the city.
A small equestrian center is near him, as is a DART train track and a creek called Jackson Branch. You could pass this place a thousand times and never know it's there.
Across the DART tracks from him, major development plans are afoot. The guys doing the developing want this guy's nine acres. Offered to buy him out. He said no. Not interested.
Jack Pierce's business, Hollywood Door, makes garage doors, but its main business is the hand manufacture of huge, very heavy industrial overhead doors. His product is expensive to ship because it's so heavy. Over the last seven decades, his family has developed a good regional trade based in part on having the business right where it is.
He does not want to move, at least not at the prices being offered. The location is worth more to him than its real estate value. This company employs 40 people, and it makes a product, which it actually sells to other people.
Makes stuff. Sells stuff. This is what used to be called a "business," as opposed to insider grease-ball political land-flipping, which is what some people think is a business today.
Got it so far? Developers offer. Business owner says no.
Then he gets a letter. An official letter. A City Hall letter. It appears that Bill Blaydes, the council person for that area, wants to call a hearing to see whether the city should yank the man's zoning out from under him, which would force him to sell.
The saga moves to the City Council chamber:
I mean, are you still with me here? The guy's been on the property since the 1950s. His business is almost invisible from the road, emits no smoke or noise, generates very light traffic. But Commissar Blaydes comes along with his letter and pretty much tells him to get the hell off his own property.Read more
And even worse in my book: While Pierce is standing there at the microphone looking up at the mighty councilpersons with his life and his family's business in his hand, Councilman Ed Oakley, one of two candidates for mayor in the June 16 runoff election, launches into this big, sleazy package of lies aimed at pushing him into giving up.
Talking in his trademark incomprehensible used-car-salesman-on-crank cadence, Oakley says to Pierce: "Let me just ask you hypothetically if you were to go through this process and the process and the staff would allow you to have your area that allowed the use that you have there today which is a manufacturing facility and in addition to that it was created into a p.d. or sub-district that allowed for the other uses such as mixed-use or whatever the neighborhood would determine but you were allowed to be legal and conforming but along with that some of the obnoxious uses that maybe the neighborhood would be fearful of such as a recycling plant or something would be left out of that and would allow you to continue the family business in perpetuity which would be legal which would be a given zoning which would allow you to use that specific use but then the additional uses would allow for residential or mixed-use development or office or retail which aren't allowed there today which actually gives you more land-use rights than what you would have today giving up some of the things that would be obnoxious would you be amenable to sitting down having that conversation?"
Pierce gave the perfect answer. He said, "Sir, I am out of my depth here today."
Oakley, a City Hall apologist who has replaced Laura Miller as the city's point person working with Trinity Commons Foundation to get the big high speed Toll Road built through the what the voters voted to fund as a Park, is not high on the list of many of his former supporters. His opponent in the Dallas's Mayoral runoff also favors building the Parkway, but as an outsider, Tom Leppert seems less offensive when he discusses it than does insider Ed Oakley. Oakley, who represents a district in the southern quadrant of the city, should be concerned for the property rights of the little guy, but seems to spout the Corporate, big developer, big dollar interest line more than adhering to a more populist Democratic line. The Dallas County Democratic Party made an unprecedented move in endorsing a candidate in what is normally a nonpartisan city race, yet many of the Democratic activists I know are less than enthusiastic about the prospects of having Mr. Oakley as Mayor. Objections do not seem to relate to his openly gay lifestyle but to his conduct in rubbing elbows with the rich and powerful and failure to champion the plight of the little man in eminent domain squabbles and other issues when John Q Citizen must face off against the City of Dallas.
In previous column's Schutze has chided DMN reporter Steve Blow for superficial coverage of City Council and the Trinity Toll /Park Project in particular.
Today, as our fledging group of activists (DFW REGIONAL CONCERNED CITIZENS) trot down to the NCTCOG offices on Six Flags Drive in Arlington to tell the RTC and NCTCOG staff how their policies disturb us, it is encouraging to open my e-mail box and find Jim Schutze's column. Schutze can make dead serious squabbles entertaining. The Texas Legislature has scattered and I'm left to summer re-runs on television. Honestly, video links to Texas Senate Transportation Hearings and battles on the Texas House Floor as representative after representative asked Speaker Craddick to vacate the chair provided much more entertainment to me this Spring than slick news entertainment journals on network TV. (For me, one of the definite pluses to watching the Texas House and Senate via internet is that they don't cover Anna Nicole, any of her offspring or relatives or alleged paramours!)
Maybe it's those early bedside stories read to me as a child about knights and the round table and crusaders rescuing the underdog from the wicked, selfish despot that are rekindled when I watch Angela Hunt and Jim Schutze take on Trinity Commons, big corporate donors and Dallas City Hall. Whatever it is, I'm gratified that the Dallas Observer fights the giant with their feather.
In Fort Worth, Mayor Mike Moncrief (dubbed by the Fort Worth Weekly as the "GASFATHER" for his facilitation of the drilling of hundreds of gas wells in the densely populated cowtown,( and Fort Worth City Council members voted to send a letter to Perry urging veto of HB 2006 (restoring protection to landowners from seizure of property through eminent domain for private commercial development. Decades of property rights were bartered away by legislators in the 78th and 79th session of the Texas Legislature by massive changes to the Texas Transportation Code and eminent domain laws were enacted by state representatives and state senators who had accepted substantial campaign contributions from pro-toll road proponents. Speaker Craddick and Lt. Governor David Dewhurst moved the bills at rapid speed through their branches of the house. (Craddick, Dewhurst, Perry, Abbott, and Susan Combs all accepted campaign donations from Zachry Construction and Zachry family members. A significant correlation emerged between Democratic and Republican incumbents who accepted Zachry and other toll road proponents campaign contributions and their roles in sponsoring, voting for and moving TTC/CDA enabling legislation through both houses of the Texas Legislature. Public outcry against the taking of hundreds of thousands of acres of Texans unified grassroots activist in both parties to descend upon Austin. This past legislative session several folks who were instrumental in getting these bills passed stood and appeared to repent. (Steve Odgen, Florence Sharpio and others). When it was time to vote, however, Odgen's "Come to Jesus" contrition evaporated and he voted for Perry's detested "market valuation language" which many think negates the two year moratorium on CDA toll roads for most of the state.
It's been a busy season. Keeping up with who's pulling what and how the truth is twisted to give an illusion but the citizens are left holding lots of debt, empty promises, and developers, politicians, and engineering firms and highway contractors sit licking their lips with cream all over their greedy mouths seems to surpass the energy it must have required British Royalty to keep up with the palace intrigues in centuries past. We may be "tilting at windmills" but with citizens' access to the internet and writers like Jim Schutze of the Dallas Observer and Jeff Prince of the Fort Worth Weekly maybe enough voters will wake up and realize that Judge Glen Whitley, Mayor Mike Moncrief and most of the City Council and County Commissioners in the DFW Region have conspired to fleece them of property and to double tax them for use of public infrastructure! Hammering on computer keys helps, but ultimately it is the voter's responsibility to evaluate whether local officials are truly looking out for citizens' welfare. Pushing that button or marking that little box in the election booth is ultimately the only way we can depose folks who misuse their office to lobby to ensure that the rich and powerful get richer and richer and the honest working folks forfeit property and political privilege to the dark room schemes of scum bags who think that the TTC is good for Texas!
Monday, May 28, 2007
Dallas County Residents - Didn't get to sign the Trinity Toll Road Petition - It's not too late
During the May 12th election, Dallas citizens many Dallas citizens signed petitions opposing the plans for the TRINITY TOLL ROAD. If you are a registered voter in Dallas County, you have opportunity to sign the petition. The cut-off date is June 29.
Trinity Vote, A Community Movement to Reclaim the Trinity River Project, includes simple instructions for citizens to collect signatures from their neighbors, co-workers, and relatives.
Instructions and all necessary materials are supplied on the Trinity Vote website.
Volunteers are urged to download the petition and collect signature. If you want to sign the petition but do not want to collect signatures, you can go by the Trinity Vote Office: Turley Law Center, Suite 100
(Central Expwy. at University Blvd.)
Sign the petition or get your petitions notarized!
TRINITYVOTE OFFICE HOURS
Monday, May 28 - Sunday, June 3
Monday: Closed (Memorial Day Holiday)
Tuesday: 11am - 1pm
Wednesday: 3pm - 7pm
Thursday: 11am - 4:30pm
Friday: 11am - 1pm
Sunday: 9am - noon
OTHER LOCATIONS TO SIGN THE PETITION:
Office of Ron Patterson - 814 W. Davis - Every Monday - Friday: 9am - 5pm
DOWNLOAD THE PETITION
Trinity Vote, A Community Movement to Reclaim the Trinity River Project, includes simple instructions for citizens to collect signatures from their neighbors, co-workers, and relatives.
Instructions and all necessary materials are supplied on the Trinity Vote website.
Volunteers are urged to download the petition and collect signature. If you want to sign the petition but do not want to collect signatures, you can go by the Trinity Vote Office: Turley Law Center, Suite 100
(Central Expwy. at University Blvd.)
Sign the petition or get your petitions notarized!
TRINITYVOTE OFFICE HOURS
Monday, May 28 - Sunday, June 3
Monday: Closed (Memorial Day Holiday)
Tuesday: 11am - 1pm
Wednesday: 3pm - 7pm
Thursday: 11am - 4:30pm
Friday: 11am - 1pm
Sunday: 9am - noon
OTHER LOCATIONS TO SIGN THE PETITION:
Office of Ron Patterson - 814 W. Davis - Every Monday - Friday: 9am - 5pm
DOWNLOAD THE PETITION
Read more http://www.trinityvote.com/faq.asp
The Trinity River Project has changed dramatically from the plan approved by Dallas voters in 1998. The magnificent urban park, complete with lakes and promenades, is nowhere to be seen. A high-speed, limited access toll road is planned to be built within what was supposed to be our Central Park.
The toll road is more than $600 million over budget. Due to safety concerns, it has recently been moved even farther into the park, further reducing parkland and lakes.
Given these significant changes, we believe Dallas voters deserve the opportunity to vote on whether we want a toll road in the Downtown Trinity Park.
We are TrinityVote, a broad-based coalition of Dallas residents who believe that our Trinity River Project is off-course and needs to get back on track.
Our coalition includes neighborhood residents, developers, environmentalists, urban planners, architects, and others who believe that putting a toll road in our park will irreparably destroy the opportunity to create an incredible signature park on the edge of Downtown Dallas.
Join us. Help us reclaim the Trinity River Project.
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