Link to article here.

Worst bottlenecks in North Texas? Right here in Tarrant
By Bud Kennedy
Star Telegram
Friday, June 20, 2008

We’re No. 1.But not in a good way.

Northeast Loop 820 in Hurst is the worst bottleneck in all of North Texas, according to a new study that ranks the region’s roads among America’s most choked, behind only Los Angeles, New York, Chicago and Washington.

There’s more bad news.

Not only is the 820-Airport Freeway interchange the No. 1 bottleneck — worse than anyplace in Dallas— but the Loop 820 exits at Denton Highway and Rufe Snow Drive are Nos. 2 and 3.

Overall, Northeast Tarrant County drivers face worse traffic than anyone in Dallas or Houston, according to a study of truck GPS data compiled by INRIX Inc. of Seattle.

Only Austin — where Interstate 35 amounts to a 5-mile-long elevated parking lot — has a freeway as crowded as Loop 820, and that city’s traffic overall is nowhere near as bad as Fort Worth’s.

What’s more, the region’s No. 4 worst bottleneck is Interstate 35W north of downtown Fort Worth. It’s congested an average of 7 hours a day.

Basically, Houston and Dallas already fixed their roads. We’re waiting for state money.

I would like to assure you that every county and city official is working on the problem.

But I couldn’t find many of them yesterday. For all I know, they were stalled in traffic at Holiday Lane.

When North Richland Hills Mayor Oscar Trevino called back, he was weaving down neighborhood streets to escape U.S. 377.

He described Loop 820 as “just ugly.”

“The people who have to drive that every day don’t say nice things,” he said. “It’s bad for our city. Businesses want to come, but they see the traffic and say, ‘Why would I get into this?’ ”

County Judge Glen Whitley is very familiar with the time-waste potential of Loop 820. He lives in Hurst.

“It’s a big drawback to the whole county,” he said. “The traffic north of Fort Worth is so unreliable that nobody can predict how long it’ll take to get to work.”

There’s a solution in the making. But lots of Texans won’t like it.

Three Spanish-owned companies are in the running for a $1 billion contract to widen Loop 820 and operate two private toll lanes. The toll would be $4 each way.

The project is part of the North Tarrant Express, a new tollway network slow off the drawing board in Austin.

“We can’t get Austin to move forward,” Whitley said. “It’s ridiculous that this is the last part of Loop 820 to be improved.”

A public hearing July 1 at 7 p.m. at Richland Hills Church of Christ will give both residents and tollway-haters a chance to vent about both the slow plans and high tolls.

Terri Hall of San Antonio leads an anti-tollway group, Texans Uniting for Reform & Freedom (TURF). She said she opposes any private tollway.

“The bottom line is, this the most expensive way to expand that road,” she said. “It means the highest possible cost to taxpayers and drivers, and hands over money to foreign companies. When the state has a record budget surplus, it’s hard to see how there’s not money for that road.”

Call it the Billion-Dollar Bottleneck.

Link to article here.

The danger of borrowing anticipated toll revenues up front to spend like Monopoly money on other road projects, is that no one knows exactly how much of that revenue will actually materialize. Given that we’re in uncharted territory with the highest price of gas in history with no end in sight, these market-based toll deals are allowing politicians to gamble away our future and build another house of cards cottage industry (courtesy of road builders & infrastructure funds) for the taxpayers to bail out, perhaps worse than the current $700 billion (and counting) mortgage mess. With the biggest drop in driving in recorded history now on the books, who do they think has the money to take these toll roads?

Toll stash in Metroplex churning out dollars
By Ben Wear | Tuesday, June 17, 2008
Austin American Statesman
By this weekend, the Dallas-Fort Worth area will have another $1 million to spend on transportation. This time next month, another $10 million or so will have rolled in.

That’s what happens when you go borrow $3.2 billion, and then don’t spend it for awhile. Of course, all this “free” money will have to paid back, and then some, on the back end.

What happened is that the North Texas Tollway Authority agreed to pay TxDOT $3.2 billion for the privilege of getting to build the Texas 121 tollway in Collin County. It won this right last year in a curious bidding war with a private group headed by Spanish toll road builder Cintra. The idea is that the road is so perfectly located in Dallas’ congested north suburbs that it will belch up generous amounts of toll revenue over the next several decades. That allowed the tollway authority to borrow much of the anticipated profits upfront.

That money, in turn, will be used in the Dallas-Fort Worth area on other transportation projects, including tollways, freeways, managed lanes, traffic signals and bike/pedestrian projects. State law requires that it be spent only from whence it came.

But for now, it’s just sitting in the bank, as it were, and churning out bucks, with the exception of about $120 million already spent on projects that were underway and had gone over budget. To be specific, the money has generated $69.2 million in earnings in a little over six months. That’s more money than the 11-county Austin districts gets in a full year, and that’s back when TxDOT actually had money to pass out to the locals.

As we said above, the tollway authority will of course have to pay interest over the next 30 years or so on the borrowed $3.2 billion, money that will come from tolls. But in the meantime, the stash will generate enough money to build a next freeway interchange (or more) for each year it sits there.

Are you getting the feeling our politicians simply refuse to get the message the grassroots is sending? After hundreds of precincts and dozens of senate conventions passed anti-toll, anti-privatization, anti-market-based tolls, and anti-Trans Texas Corridor resolutions, thirty three members of the Republican state platform committee erased all their work in about 10 minutes.

The Trans Texas Corridor plank has strong wording in this year’s Republican platform, but the call to repeal the TTC legislation was removed from this year’s version. The 2006 version was: “Because there are issues of confiscation of private land, State and National sovereignty and other similar concerns, we urge the repeal of the Trans Texas Corridor legislation.”

The 2008 plank says:

“We emphatically oppose the Trans Texas Corridor in any form or manner. We call for a full investigation of any public official authorizing any form of eminent domain for the Trans Texas Corridor and foreign funding.”

There is also a call asking Congress to withdraw from the Security and Prosperity Partnership (SPP) and the formation of the North American Union.

Republicans officially pro-toll tax

Then, the strong 2006 anti-toll plank (“We oppose tolls charged for traversing previously toll free roadways and disallow continued tolls except for maintenance on existing toll roads already paid for”) was replaced with this nebulous, awkwardly worded statement:

“We support the legitimate construction of toll roads in Texas, but we oppose converting existing state and federal roads to American-owned toll roads without voter approval.”

OKAY to build foreign-controlled toll roads?

This plank is strangely silent on foreign-controlled toll roads and seems to contradict the Trans Texas Corridor plank. By its silence on foreign-controlled toll roads, it allows such without voter approval. Also, no freeway should be converted to a toll road, period! It’s not something the public needs to vote on, it’s DOUBLE TAXATION and a money grab. It shouldn’t be done, EVER! Then note the pro-toll statement at the outset, “we support…toll roads in Texas.” Oh really? The grassroots sure don’t, especially when they’re paying $4 a gallon at the pump and spending nearly $100 to fill their gas tanks just to get to work!

Waste, fraud, abuse leave taxpayers in no mood for higher transportation taxes

They also don’t support them when TxDOT is wasting the taxpayers’ money on $20 million dollar earmarks to build a park in downtown Dallas and $18 million dollar rest stops equipped with free wi-fi, not to mention $9 million dollar propaganda campaigns pushing the TTC and toll roads down our throats. The taxpayers don’t support new toll taxes when the Legislature sees fit to siphon off nearly 50% of our gas taxes to non-transportation uses like tourism promotion and enhancing employee benefits in the Attorney General’s office.

The pro-toll special interest machine won out over the grassroots

So, when yours truly, among others, attempted to amend the platform to revert back to the previous planks. Here’s what happened. The Party had scarcely provided a copy of the new revised platform only an hour or so before bringing the platform to a vote. So few if any delegates had the chance to review the changes. None of the changes were notated, making deciphering any differences between this year’s and the 2006 platform near impossible. All the while, the delegates were voting on Party leadership with no time to review the platform thoroughly or even in a cursory manner.

Delegates wishing to amend the platform had to write out two copies of the proposed changes and bring them to the mic. By the time I had even one written, a call for a vote came from the floor ending all debate and the platform passed in less than 10 minutes. I wasn’t the only one chapped at this railroading. Another said from the mic, “if you were just going to rubber stamp the platform, why should we bother to travel from all over the state at our expense to come here in the first place?” The whole thing was a done deal before the grassroots knew what hit ’em.

The elitist, we-know-best leadership of the Republican Party has not only lost its way, its strong-arm railroading tactics have caused them to completely trample on the grassroots responsible for getting them elected in the first place. Thousands of Texans passed the anti-toll resolutions with unanimous support at their precincts and senate conventions. They sent a clear, unequivocal NO TOLL TAX message to the Party leadership only to be railroaded by 33 members of the platform committee doing the bidding of the Party elites under the spell of the road lobby, ala toller-in-chief Rick Perry. Not only does this not bode well for the November General Election, it gives any smart Democrat an open door to eviscerating Republicans as the pro-toll party wanting to levy the MOST EXPENSIVE TRANSPORTATION TAX upon Texans at a time of record high gas prices.

Link to article here. Read TURF’s response to TxDOT announcement here. This isn’t as it appears…the new corridor isn’t toll viable so they have to revert back to the existing “free” competition to a toll road and toll it, so they get their monopoly in place!

TxDOT says TTC won’t mess with rural Texas; Review urges agency overhaul to restore public trust
By Zen Zheng
Housotn Chronicle
June 13, 2008
After waves of public protest, the Texas Department of Transportation has decided that it would not mess with rural Texas with its proposed Interstate-69/Trans-Texas Corridor that would stretch from Mexico to Texarkana.

The project route, it announced, would instead be confined to the right of way of existing major highways. (See a map of the proposed route below.)

To opponents of the project, the dark clouds didn’t dissipate, but has only changed its shade.

TxDOT’s wording maintains a degree of vagueness as it said it would “consider” sticking to existing highways “wherever possible,” Terri Hall, founder of the opposition group, Texas United for Reform and Freedom, pointed out.

Hall said that despite TxDOT’s announcement, the corridor “can still be a 1,200-foot wide land-grabbing, privatized, tolled” facility. She said because the right of way of existing highways is already paid for with gas taxes, building the corridor as a tolled facility would be “double taxation.” She added:

This corridor was promised as a free interstate highway for decades, now they’ll convert existing freeways like (U.S.) 59 into privately-controlled toll roads. Somehow we feel in no mood to celebrate.

If TxDOT changes the scope of the project like a new route and study area, TxDOT has to, by law per (National Environmental Policy Act), redo the environmental study totally and take public comment all over again, not just submit some letter to the (Federal Highway Administration) reflecting the change.

Much of the route would now go along U.S. 59. In the Houston area including Fort Bend County, in addition to U.S. 59, Loop 610 and Grand Parkway remain TxDOT’s options for the corridor, according to Amadeo Saenz, the department’s executive director.

The Harris County Toll Road Authority is pushing for the construction of the northwest segment of the planned Grand Parkway, which would be tied into the namesake road through Fort Bend.

It is unclear how the changed I-69/Trans-Texas Corridor plan would affect our region. While the exact route is yet to be determined, earlier plans had shown that areas near Huntsville, Navasota, Prairie View, Waller, Sealy, Wallis, Kendleton, Richmond and Rosenberg would be in the corridor’s path.

Fort Bend County Judge Bob Hebert Friday called the TxDOT’s decision “a good first step” but cautiously said “there is a great deal of work left to be done.” On the possibility of the corridor coming through Fort Bend County, he had this comment for me:

One thing I will work to assure is that the existing portions of US 59 and the Grand Parkway within Fort Bend County are not used as part of a Houston by-pass. The growth of local traffic demands on those two highways prohibits such a use.

Two Republican state lawmakers were quick to praise TxDOT’s announcement.

Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison hailed the decision as “a major victory” for landowners, farmers and ranchers who have feared that their land could be taken by the government by eminent domain.

Rep. Kevin Brady from The Woodlands, who led a nine-member state congressional delegation to push for the corridor to stay out of the way of rural communities, said he wants to also push for upgrading existing highways, including U.S. 59, to “interstate standards.” Doing so would “restore public support” for the Trans-Texas Corridor, he said.

Observers, however, doubt that the public would ever support the TTC project. Residents, community leaders and officials at various government levels, including some Fort Bend County commissioners, have repeatedly expressed frustration with TxDOT’s alleged lack of regard for local and community input in many of its projects. Public trust in the state agency has been greatly eroded, they say.

The Sunset Advisory Commission, which reviews agencies regularly on their performance, in its report issued this month, among a host of recommendations, calls for the replacement of the current five-member Texas Transportation Commission, which is TxDOT’s governing board, with a single commissioner and shorten the term of office from presently six years to two years.

Here is an excerpt from the report:

The Sunset review of the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) occurred against a backdrop of distrust and frustration with the Department and the demand for more transparency, accountability, and responsiveness. Many expressed concerns that TxDOT was ‘out of control,’ advancing its own agenda against objections of both the Legislature and the public . . . tweaking the status quo is simply not enough.

Nevertheless, critics said that even with the downsizing of the TxDOT’s governing board, the lone commissioner would still be appointed by Gov. Rick Perry, who led the crusade for the unpopular Trans-Texas Corridor plan. Critics noted that the current commissioners have been advancing the very agenda of one who appointed them.

Link to article here.The free fall continues…not the time for new toll taxes!

Stocks tumble 206 points on oil surge
Wall Street slumps as crude prices rally more than $5 a barrel, the dollar falls and Fed’s ‘Beige Book’ shows more weakness.
By Alexandra Twin, CNNMoney.com senior writer
June 11, 2008

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — Stocks tumbled Wednesday, with the Dow losing over 200 points, amid a $5 spike in oil prices, more problems for the bank sector and a report showing continued economic weakness.

The Dow Jones industrial average (INDU) lost 206 points, or 1.7%. The broader Standard & Poor’s 500 (SPX) index lost 1.7% and the Nasdaq composite (COMP) lost 2.2%.

The Dow Jones Transportation average fell 4.7% on the jump in oil prices.

“Oil prices are spiking today and there’s also this renewed issue with the financial sector,” said Greg Church, president at Church Capital.

Lehman Brothers (LEH, Fortune 500) stock fell as investors continued to react to the company’s huge quarterly loss announced earlier this week. Merrill Lynch downgraded the stock to “neutral” from “buy.”

And Church said that the financial sector was being plagued by vague market rumors that supposedly bullet-proof Goldman Sachs (GS, Fortune 500) could take a big hit.

Anheuser-Busch (BUD, Fortune 500) stock could be active Thursday after it was announced late Wednesday that Belgian rival InBev has made a nearly $47 billion offer for the company. Reports suggested InBev was interested in the maker of Bud a few weeks ago. Shares gained 7% in after-hours trading.

In other news, it was announced after the close of trade that the House bid to extend jobless benefits beyond the six-month mark has failed. (Full story)

Thursday brings the May retail sales report from the Commerce Department. Sales are expected to have risen 0.5% after falling 0.2% in April. Sales excluding autos are expected to have 0.7% after rising 0.5% in April.

Oil prices surge. U.S. light crude oil for July delivery rose $5.07 to settle at $136.38 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, after the government’s weekly supply report showed crude prices shrank more than expected.

Meanwhile the DOE forecast that oil prices will stay well above $100 a barrel and gas prices will stay above $4 a gallon through 2009.

“You’re seeing a growing awareness that the rising price of oil is impacting everyone’s ability to do business,” said Mark Travis, president and CEO Intrepid Capital Funds.

Additionally, he said investors were responding to the ongoing malaise in financial markets.

The Federal Reserve released its periodic ‘Beige Book’ survey of economic activity in the afternoon. As expected, the survey showed continued economic weakness in late April and early May, due to weaker consumer spending and advancing commodity prices.

Eye on the Fed: Chairman Ben Bernanke hinted earlier this week that the central bank will soon need to raise interest rates, to combat higher pricing pressure – and to prop up the weak U.S. dollar.

Fed Vice Chairman Donald Kohn, speaking at a Fed conference in Massachusetts, said that the rise in oil prices is raising consumer inflation expectations and that it is critical for these expectations to be contained. Fed Governor Randall Kroszner spoke at the same conference on consumer protection and the role of credit in the economy.

Company news: Corporate Express NV, a Dutch distributor of office supplies, accepted an improved $2.7 billion bid from Staples (SPLS, Fortune 500).

Alcoa (AA, Fortune 500) tumbled almost 8% after a JPMorgan (JPM, Fortune 500) analyst said that the aluminum producer is not looking to sell itself or spin off part of its business and that this will be a disappointment for Wall Street.

Including Alcoa, 27 out of 30 Dow components slid. Other big decliners included AIG (AIG, Fortune 500), American Express (AXP, Fortune 500), Citigroup (C, Fortune 500) and General Motors (GM, Fortune 500). The lone Dow advancers were the oil components Exxon Mobil (XOM, Fortune 500) and Chevron (CVX, Fortune 500) and chemical maker DuPont (DD, Fortune 500).

Market breadth was negative. On the New York Stock Exchange, losers topped winners four to one on volume of 1.39 billion shares. On the Nasdaq, decliners topped advancers three to one on volume of 2.17 billion shares.

Gas hits new record: The national average price for a gallon of regular unleaded gas rose to a record $4.052 from the previous day’s record of $4.043, AAA reported.

Other markets: The dollar slipped versus the euro and yen.

Treasury prices advanced, lowering the yield on the benchmark 10-year note to 4.07% from 4.10% late Tuesday. Bond prices and yields move in opposite directions.

COMEX gold for August delivery rose $11.70 to settle at $882.90 an ounce.

We still have concerns about this announcement by TxDOT for the reasons cited below.

With the 391 commissions, TxDOT has to do what these local governments require of them by invoking the coordination mandate in the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) “to the greatest extent practicable.” That puts TxDOT in a HUGE legal box they cannot wiggle out of. The wording of this TTC-69 TxDOT statement (and the transportation commission’s minute order from a few weeks ago. Read more here) is very intentionally saying they’ll simply “consider” existing right of way, that is NOT a mandate to do so which the 391 commission by contrast can force. So anyway, TxDOT isn’t giving up much, they’re playing legal games. Needless to say, we’re very cautious about this announcement. We think it’s to quell the forming of more commissions and to make concessions to the Legislature before the Sunset Commission/Legislature guts the agency if they don’t “act” more responsive to the public.

Also at issue: It can still be 1,200 foot wide land grabbing, privatized tolled corridor and it will toll existing right of way already paid for with gas taxes. They claim it won’t toll existing lanes, but they’ve been downgrading the existing lanes to frontage roads all over the state. Why should we believe TxDOT now?

If they change the scope of the project so dramatically, TxDOT should have to, by law per NEPA, redo the environmental study totally, not just submit some letter to the FHWA. They should be required to redo the document reflecting the new project route (see map here) and the new “alternative” selection using existing right of way replacing the new corridor “alternative” as the current document states. Stay tuned for more updates.

_________________________________________

TxDOT PRESS RELEASE
June 11, 2008

AUSTIN – The Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) announced today that it will recommend that the I-69/Trans-Texas Corridor (TTC) Project be developed using existing highway facilities wherever possible. If additional travel lanes are added to existing highways, only the new lanes would have tolls.

“After a dozen town hall meetings, nearly 50 public hearings, and countless one-on-one conversations, it is clear to us that Texans want us to use existing roadways to start building the Texas portion of Interstate 69,” said Texas Transportation Commissioner Ted Houghton.

“TxDOT’s recommendation would effectively shrink our environmental study down to roads such as U.S. Highways 77 and 281 in South Texas, State Highway 44 and U.S. Highway 59 along the Coastal Bend and U.S. Highways 84 and 59 in East Texas. We are dropping consideration of new corridors that would run west of Houston in addition to other proposals for new highway footprint in other parts of the state.”

TxDOT Executive Director Amadeo Saenz, in a letter to the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA), wrote “The preliminary basis for this decision centers on the review of nearly 28,000 public comments made on the Tier One DEIS (Draft Environmental Impact statement). The overwhelming sentiment of these comments focused on the need to improve the existing transportation network” rather than building a new corridor for the project.

TxDOT’s stated intention has been to focus on making needed improvements to existing and planned transportation facilities within the I-69/TTC study area. Such upgrades may fully satisfy the project’s need to improve the international, interstate, and intrastate movement of people and goods for many decades.

In May, the Texas Transportation Commission adopted guiding principles and policies that will govern the development, construction and operation of toll road projects on the state highway system and the Trans-Texas Corridor. In addition to reaffirming that only new lanes added to an existing highway will be tolled and that there will be no reduction in the number of non-tolled lanes, the Commission stated that wherever possible, existing right-of-way would be considered for the development of new projects.

“The Commission made it clear that they wanted their newly-adopted principles applied to the development of important projects like I-69 and a parallel corridor to I-35,” said Saenz. “We are closer than ever to realizing the promise and the potential of I-69, and we will move forward with this important Transportation Commission policy in the front of our minds.”

Saenz said that TxDOT would continue to talk to the public about I-69/TTC, and he encouraged Texans to ask questions and share their ideas at the department’s “Keep Texas Moving” website (www.keeptexasmoving.com). He noted that the recently-named I-69 Corridor Advisory Committee will help guide TxDOT’s work on the project. Saenz said he looked forward to the appointment of Segment Advisory Committees comprised of local leaders who will help further develop I-69/TTC.

“We also want to keep working with our Congressional delegation and the Texas Legislature,” added Transportation Commissioner Houghton. “Legislative leadership, public involvement and local commitment will all be essential if we are going build this long-awaited highway.”

TxDOT is preparing its report for FHWA following completion of the public involvement process for the environmental review of I-69/TTC. If today’s recommendation is approved by FHWA, plans for a separate new corridor would be dropped from future environmental reviews, and the existing infrastructure would serve as the study area for future environmental review. TxDOT is expected to submit its Final Environmental Impact Statement (FEIS) for public review prior to federal approval late in 2008 or early in 2009. FHWA approval of the FEIS does not authorize property acquisition or construction.

In the future, the northern and southern portions of I-69/TTC could be linked in the Houston area. Houston’s connection to I-69/TTC, including access to the Port of Houston, will be determined in coordination with elected leaders and transportation planners in the area.

A copy of Saenz’s letter to FHWA and a new map reflecting TxDOT’s recommendation are available on the internet at www.keeptexasmoving.com

Find out more at www.txdot.gov.
For more Information call TxDOT’s Government & Public Affairs Division at (512) 463-8588.