"A new financial evaluation of the transit expansion program shows that the shortfall has grown by $100 million since last summer."
http://www.denverpost.com/breakingnews/ci_11830130
DENVER AND THE WEST
Peña Blvd. plan on hold
Logistical stop signs change mayor's mind on idea to toll Peña Blvd.
By Christopher N. Osher
The Denver Post
POSTED: 03/04/2009 12:30:00 AM MST
UPDATED: 03/04/2009 02:02:15 AM MST
The notion of charging drivers a toll on Peña Boulevard to help pay for the huge deficit facing the FasTracks regional transit project all but disintegrated Tuesday as Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper called the plan unlikely and not one he considers viable.
Mayors in the northern suburbs, worried that their FasTracks rail lines could get cut to bring costs under control, have suggested tolling Peña as an option. Broomfield Mayor Pat Quinn said Hickenlooper had brought up the concept during a Metro Mayors Caucus retreat.
Post Poll - Peña Toll
Would you want to see a vehicle toll on Peña Boulevard to help pay for train service to DIA and FasTracks expansion? (Read the story.)
Total Votes = 3524
No
68.70 %
Not sure
4.511 %
Yes
22.64 %
Don't care or never drive on Peña
4.143 %
But Hickenlooper on Tuesday quickly distanced himself from the idea, saying he floated the proposal during the meeting months ago as just one of numerous options under consideration. He said he had since learned there were logistical hurdles that made such tolls unworkable on the primary route to and from Denver International Airport.
"It is very unlikely that anyone will toll Peña Boulevard," he said at a news conference. "The technology isn't in place, and I think it would be down near the bottom of the list, but it was something that was discussed by a number of people over the last six months as one of a many funding possibilities."
The tolling proposal would be a partial cure for the Regional Transportation District's FasTracks project, now facing a budget gap that has grown to $2.2 billion.
Construction costs that surged last summer have since dropped. But the sales-tax revenue needed to build the project has dropped even further because of the economic downturn, increasing the current funding gap.
On Tuesday night, RTD general manager Cal Marsella told the agency's directors that tolling Peña Boulevard could yield about $500 million that could be used to reduce the shortfall in FasTracks funding.
A new financial evaluation of the transit expansion program shows that the shortfall has grown by $100 million since last summer.
Feds would want hunk of pie
Hickenlooper, who hadn't returned calls Monday because he was traveling, said Tuesday that he had learned that the Federal Aviation Administration had helped finance the building of Peña and probably would have to approve any tolls. He said that the federal government would probably want to receive much of the toll revenue generated along the road.
"You wouldn't make any money, so why would anyone support it?" Hickenlooper said.
Tolling Peña had already received dim reviews from business travelers, residents along the road and Denver City Councilman Michael Hancock, whose district encompasses the road.
"That toll idea has been passed around before," Hancock said. "I think it would be a very bad move because a lot of local people would be hurt by it."
Hickenlooper said that while the tolling proposal seems unlikely, it's clear that he and the other mayors must come up with a revenue solution for FasTracks, probably within the next two months.
He said RTD and the Metro Mayors Caucus are working on finding a solution "so that we can deliver a project this community believes in and desires, and what I'm going to support is the one that is most efficient at delivering what the voters were promised and is the least burdensome."
"I've been fairly consistent"
Hickenlooper said he doesn't support eliminating FasTracks lines as a way to reduce costs.
"I think I've been fairly consistent all the way along that we, as a community and a region, made a commitment together that we were going to build something, and that we should follow through on that," he said.
He stressed that he is withholding judgment on what to do until the Metro Mayors Caucus finishes weighing options and makes recommendations.
"I think that if you go talk to all the mayors, they're not waiting for one person to put a cape on and step forward," Hickenlooper said. "If you talk to the mayors, they are struggling with a very difficult problem, but I think they are very committed to doing it as a group."
Hickenlooper stressed that FasTracks is vital for the region, making note of last year's record-high gas prices.
"What was happening to our lower-income families at that point in terms of their mobility costs?" he said. "That's why FasTracks is so important.
Christopher N. Osher: 303-954-1747 or
[email protected]
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