Reston resident and real estate agent Rob Whitfield has been a fan of extending metro service out to Dulles for over 20 years but he cannot back the most recent incarnation of the project.
"The things that makes me different from most people that are upset is that I was a big rail supporter but I cannot support this," said Whitfield in an interview Monday.
Whitfield and his neighbors will be paying for the costs of the rail project through increased fees along the Dulles Toll Road but they won’t see most of the benefits, he said.
The Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority, who will take over a primary managers to the project this year, expects revenue from the Dulles Toll Road to cover over half the costs of the $2.7 billion, up to 75 percent of the project’s cost overruns and to pay back $200 million line of credit it hopes to get from the federal government.
The toll road must also be used to maintain the road, according to project documents.
According to the Reston resident, the
Tysons Corner metro stations will be used mostly by people from Arlington, Maryland, D.C. and Tysons, not by people in western Fairfax and Loudoun who use the toll road.
"If you are a resident of Tysons you won’t be paying a nickel for this rail. If you are a resident of D.C., Arlington or Maryland, you won’t be paying for this project," said Whitfield. "I think the residents of Reston are being treated unfairly."
Whitfield and others like him are not alone in their concern about the rising costs of the Dulles Rail Project. A federal review of the rail project released last week cited several serious concerns about the management and financing of the metro extension, including the impact on the Dulles Toll Road.
U.S. Reps. Tom Davis (R-11) and Jim Moran (D-8) both expressed their own concerns about the project after the report was released last week. The Northern Virginia congressional delegation has not been involved in discussions over rail management, which has been handled mostly by the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors and Govs. Mark Warner and Tim Kaine, they said.
"[The report] raises the issue of whether we can justify this project at $2.7 billion. … We are hanging on by our finger tips," said Moran.
The federal report’s author, Acting Assistant Inspector General for Surface and Maritime Programs Rebecca Batts, urged the Federal Transit Administrator to proceed with caution when making decisions about the Dulles rail’s federal funding allocation.
The Federal Transit Administration is expected to make a decision on whether it will approve nearly $1 billion in federal funding for Dulles Rail during the next 30 days.
At certain points, the report draws comparisons between the Dulles project and other public works fiascos, notably the Boston Central Artery/Tunnel Project, otherwise known as the Boston "Big Dig."
It also focuses on concerns about the Dulles Rail’s financial management, citing that the cost of the project has grown over $1 billion while its schedule has slipped more than four years since 2004.
"In past reviews of major projects, rapid cost growth and schedule slippages so early in the project were clear signs of risk. The reliability of the current cost estimate is unknown," stated the Inspector General’s report.
Fairfax County Board of Supervisors chairman Gerry Connolly said the report has brought nothing new to the table and many of its concerns have already been discussed.
"The report itself is nothing but a rehash of old issues," he said in phone interview this week. "This is a solid project. It is big one. It is complex."
Connolly added that the longer the federal government waits to approve the project for funding, the more expensive it will become.
"If they don’t delay, we can make this work," he said.
Due to rising expenses, officials also recommended that the local funding package be reworked since "even more local funding would be needed."
The report states that Fairfax County — which has provided its funding through a special tax district along the propose metro corridor — may have come up with more revenue if the project’s price continues to go up.
Like Whitfield, officials in the Inspector General’s office also believe the project relies too heavily on toll road revenue to fund the project. They were concerned that Virginia Department of Transportation did not put a cap on the amount the Airports Authority can raise the toll.
"Users of the Dulles Toll Road could be subjected to large toll increases in the future if high project costs require more and more local funding," according to the report.
Fairfax County would have preferred that the state government put it up its share of the money instead of using the toll road to cover its expenses. But the supervisors intend to monitor the rise in tolls closely, said Connolly.
"We share the concern that we not be overly reliant on tolls," said Connolly.
The report also raises questions as to whether the project is still cost effective. The project was nearing unacceptable levels earlier this year when the price was set at approximately $2 billion. It has now risen to $2.7 billion.
The Inspector General’s report stated that the limited competition over control of the project — which was given to a joint venture of Bechtel Infrastructure and Washington Group International — may have contributed to the expensive growth.
"Virginia entered into its first contractual agreement with the [Bechtel/Washington Group International] at the beginning of preliminary engineering, when there were still many unknowns about the project," said the report.
Some supervisors have raised these concerns before. Dana Kauffman (D-Lee) and Linda Smyth (D-Providence) voted against allocating money to Dulles Rail last month partially because of the number of unknowns about the project. The other eight supervisors voted for the project.
"The report bears many of the same concerns that Linda and I had raised," said Kauffman. "There is a means to do this."