I-5 Bridge Replacement - Formerly Columbia River Crossing | Proposed

[tworivers]

Let's hope Liberty gets enough votes for a Metro 'no'. Funny that nobody has discussed yet what will happen if Metro does end up voting no. Does anyone here know what the actual consequences of such a scenario would be??

Columbia River Crossing: Taskforce says timing is key to project funding
Despite opposition, advocates of the project ramp up efforts to move forward, with an eye toward federal financing

POSTED: 06:00 AM PDT Tuesday, May 6, 2008
BY TYLER GRAF

With the release late last week of the draft environmental impact statement for the Columbia River Crossing, the taskforce behind the Portland-Vancouver bridge project is busy ramping up its push to keep the project moving despite opposition, saying timing is key to the feasibility of the bridge’s construction.

The report, which outlines the work currently completed on the project as well as possible outcomes to the regional transportation corridor if the bridge is not constructed, contains nearly 1,000 pages. The project, estimated to cost about $4 billion, will rely on federal transit dollars. The window of availability for some of that money is narrowing with each passing month

The Columbia River Taskforce on June 24 will meet to decide which of the available bridge options – including building a new bridge, building nothing and building an auxiliary bridge – will be best for the region while remaining affordable.

Danielle Cogan, a spokeswoman for the taskforce, said the project has to move forward quickly to make federal financing work.

In order to utilize about $700 million in federal New Starts financing – which would be granted to the Washington Department of Transportation and C-TRAN, with WSDOT providing toll credits to match the grant – the project must apply for it by August 15, said Carley Francis of the Columbia River Crossing Taskforce.

“That grant is led in strong part by a cost-by-ridership analysis,” she said, adding that the taskforce will have to provide a cost-benefit analysis to justify the funding.

The group is also eying another $700 million in Federal Transportation Reauthorization funds, which become available every six years. If the project misses qualifying for the next handout period in 2009, it would have to wait until 2015 for more money to become available.

Qualifying for both those funding pots is going to mean picking an option for the bridge. But in order to do that, the taskforce has to go back to the public and win approval from government agencies such as ODOT and Metro.

Agency comments and public review sessions will begin May 13. The task force will make a bridge recommendation on June 24, with public comment on the choice being taken through July 17, when Metro votes on the bridge option.

[tworivers]

I don't have the time to cut and paste the whole article right now, but three Metro councilors have an alternative resolution calling for tolling the bridge and using the money for a seismic upgrade and transit. Potentially huge news.

Story in today's Oregonian.

[pdxman]

And you know people in Vancouver will be pissed after reading this, especially if it postpones the federal aid and bridge. Tolls and transit are the like the anti-christ for vancouverites.

[alexjon]

Can't we just build a bridge AROUND Vancouver?

[PuyoPiyo]

Originally Posted by pdxman

And you know people in Vancouver will be pissed after reading this, especially if it postpones the federal aid and bridge. Tolls and transit are the like the anti-christ for vancouverites.

Don't you judge us, the Vancouverites. I am not Christian and I know many of Vancouverites that are not. I, myself, as Vancouverite, do find the light rail exciting

[edgepdx]

Thanks goodness someones starting to talk sense about the insane $4B, 12 lane monster. This thing was just being railroaded though by the development interests before anyone even knew what was happening. We all know that the only thing that will happen after the bridge is built is there will be an hour long jam up on 405 and farther down I5. You can't just increase the size of the funnel and expect traffic to get better.

I think as we see gas prices hit $5 gallon soon, the market for housing north of Vancouver will dry up anyway, so why spend the money on something that's not going to be used when we could invest in projects geared towards the future rather than trying to preserve the auto driven past.

[pdxman]

Umm my remark was not directed at religious beliefs, sorry you misunderstood. It was more like a metaphor for the general feelings of the those who live across the river. I'm glad you like light rail but I'm afraid you're definitely in the minority when it comes to acceptance of transit. Maybe you're zeal for LRT will rub off on others

[philopdx]

You know, I have a funny feeling if Metro nixes the 12 lane bridge, then Vancouver (or WA) will nix the light rail out of spite.

And all this talk about I-5 being a bottleneck for interstate truck traffic - shouldn't the trucks be using I-205 anyway?

When I lived in Vancouver, I would have been pissed. But then I started thinking after I moved down to PDX, why should we pay half of the non-federal share when Washingtonians are getting 75% of the benefit?

[RED_PDXer]

I think Portland, and Oregon in general, would be willing to help out for the cost of light-rail. We like Vancouverites who use transit in our city, and there are lots of them already. C-Tran runs about 25 buses an hour in the peak hour between Vancouver and downtown Portland. Clearly, there's a demand for transit between the two cities and light rail would help increase that demand. It just makes sense institute congestion pricing and build better transit.

[Civ E JB]

So the seismic upgrades would mean we can stop worrying about a serious bridge failure and the transit is obviously beneficial, but these do nothing to address the poor design of the bridge and surrounding interchanges, most parts of which are highly substandard when compared to modern code. I don't think too many people get a kick out of bridge lifts on a freeway either. I guess I just think the current I-5 crossing is no longer appropriate for what the Portland/Vancouver metro area has developed into. I'm not advocating a 16 lane freeway though.

Also, I fail to understand the concern about the width of the bridge. So what if the bridge is 10 or 12 lanes wide? It's only carrying a 6 lane freeway. Auxiliary lanes disappear shortly before and after the bridge.

As for transit's popularity in Vancouver/Clark County, I remember seeing an article in The Columbian a year or two back with a poll showing much more positive sentiment for light rail than 13 years ago when it was originally rejected. The tolling aspect will be hard to get support for but I think the residents of SW Washington can be made to see there really isn't another feasible method for payment. Despite the opinions of others here, it isn't a county of 415,000 idiots for crying out loud.

And for Phil, there are certainly plenty of trucks using I-205 already but I'm guessing we're talking about all of the interstate truck traffic needing access to the large industrial areas of Portland, i.e. port properties and Swan Island along I-5.

So there's 85 cents worth, give or take.

[PuyoPiyo]

Originally Posted by pdxman

Umm my remark was not directed at religious beliefs, sorry you misunderstood. It was more like a metaphor for the general feelings of the those who live across the river. I'm glad you like light rail but I'm afraid you're definitely in the minority when it comes to acceptance of transit. Maybe you're zeal for LRT will rub off on others

Ooo my bad

[westsider]

Originally Posted by philopdx

You know, I have a funny feeling if Metro nixes the 12 lane bridge, then Vancouver (or WA) will nix the light rail out of spite.

And all this talk about I-5 being a bottleneck for interstate truck traffic - shouldn't the trucks be using I-205 anyway?

When I lived in Vancouver, I would have been pissed. But then I started thinking after I moved down to PDX, why should we pay half of the non-federal share when Washingtonians are getting 75% of the benefit?

As far as through trucks using I-205 instead of I-5, it just doesnt make sense. Assuming that a truck is driving from Wilsonville or further south to somewhere north of I-205's terminus, and also assuming I-5 is slow and I-205 is clear (which is never, I-205 has more daily traffic), you would have to lose almost 20 minutes on I-5 to make it worth going the other way. There seems to be a misconception of I-205 as an alternative to I-5 but there is enough distance between them they serve different areas. Vancouver would never have grown as far east as it has if the Glenn Jackson was never built, thats why I would rather see the Interstate bridge imploded and replaced with a ferry than have a bigger bridge built. Even if Oregon only paid for a quarter of it, a new bridge, with light rail, would only serve to drive more growth in Clark County and further harm Portland and the region.

[bvpcvm]

http://www.oregonlive.com/printer/pr...010.xml&coll=7

Light-rail fears revive at I-5 bridge hearing

Vancouver - People at a packed meeting suggest alternatives to major I-5 corridor construction

Thursday, May 29, 2008
DYLAN RIVERA
The Oregonian

VANCOUVER -- It was supposed to be a public hearing about a $4.2 billion proposal to replace the Interstate 5 bridge over the Columbia River that connects Portland and Vancouver. And most participants did talk about the small details and the big impacts of what would be the costliest public works project in the Northwest in decades.

But barely beneath the surface of the two-hour comment session Wednesday night was a southwest Washington community divided about its relationship with Portland and the potential for a light-rail extension.

"The line ought to be drawn at the river because I do fear the crime that Portland is experiencing with the system, as well as increased taxes," said Robert Ross, who moved to Vancouver from Portland five years ago. "This will give Portland and TriMet government a toehold. I fear it will just expand from that beginning."

Such was the frequent sentiment at the first federally required hearing on the Columbia River Crossing, a proposed remedy to the I-5 traffic choke point that straddles two cities, two states and a seeming cultural canyon. Another hearing will be held at 6 p.m. today at the Expo Center in North Portland.

The hearings are just one way the public can comment on a federal study of five alternatives for what to do about the bridge -- including doing nothing. A 39-member task force will recommend one of the alternatives June 24.

The alternative with the most local political support would replace the six-lane bridge with a 12-lane toll bridge, light-rail extension to Vancouver and upgrades for six highway interchanges. In a delicate political trade-off, Portland leaders have demanded light rail as part of the project, while Vancouver politicians have sought more highway lanes and interchange improvements that can connect east and western parts of the city.

Some of the 170 or so in the standing room-only audience at the Red Lion Hotel Vancouver at the Quay used their three-minute comment time to press for completely different solutions: a westside bypass of downtown Portland, widening of I-5 in central and southern Portland, better use of Interstate 205 as a freight route, even an eight-mile elevated freeway from Vancouver to Portland.

But light rail was the key issue.

Often, such hearings bring out mainly naysayers about light rail, said Leonard Bauhs, president of Vancouver's Northwest neighborhood association. "I am a yea-sayer," he said.

When he lived in the Washington, D.C., area for five years, Bauhs said he did without a car by using the subway system.
Unlike that system, which started with just one line, Vancouver can start its light-rail line by connecting with the existing network in Portland. Future generations in a Clark County with 1 million residents would want rail, he said.

"With the promise of federal dollars now, we need to act now," he said.

But most Vancouver residents who spoke were outraged by the prospect of light rail.

"I do not want the current atmosphere and present community in downtown Vancouver to be erased," Suzan Hoffmann said. "I do not want to live in a downtown urban setting like Portland. If I did, I'd move there."

Hoffman said the light-rail project could radically change the Shumway neighborhood north of downtown Vancouver, but would leave the duplex where she lives.

Many expressed outrage at a political process that they said seems to have favored light rail from the start.

"A lot of our people are getting the feeling that this is being shoved down our throat," said Stephanie Turlay of Vancouver. "We have been told by our mayor, 'no light rail, no bridge,' and that's a threat."

A few speakers mentioned a proposal by three members of the Portland-area Metro Council to charge tolls on the bridge for a few years first -- and improve on-ramps and pay for earthquake proofing -- then decide later how many lanes might be needed on a new bridge.

Most in Vancouver would consider that crazy, said Thom McConathy, a landscape gardener and lifelong Vancouver resident.

"I don't know what's wrong with us here. We're provincial," he said. "We have to realize that we're going to have some dependence on communal transportation."

Dylan Rivera: 503-221-8532; dylanrivera@news.oregonian.com

[rsbear]

Originally Posted by bvpcvm

"The line ought to be drawn at the river because I do fear the crime that Portland is experiencing with the system, as well as increased taxes," said Robert Ross, who moved to Vancouver from Portland five years ago. "This will give Portland and TriMet government a toehold. I fear it will just expand from that beginning."

I've moved 180 degrees on this since it was first announced and no longer support any part of the project. At this point I don't want the City of Portland or the State of Oregon to pay one dime to build Vancouver a new bridge, widen their section of I5, or extend MAX across the river. If Vancouver wants any of these improvements, they should pay for them themselves. Until then, they can just staying in the sprawling suburban hell that has become Clark County.

[NJD]

Just look at this monster. Look at the huge interchange on Hayden Island. I'm surprised anyone in DT Vancouver would want to have this giant ugly mess in their front yards...

[BrG]

Pearson Airfield and the FAA is the biggest culprit in this having no chance to be much other than boring.

Glenn Jackson revisited.

[westsider]

Regardless of how it looks, I've gone from mild interest to hoping this boondoggle gets tied up until 2075. Replacing the bridge has nothing to do with the health of the region and transportation, its all about getting more federal pork and populating N Clark County. There is little to no danger of a collapse, the Interstate bridge has no less capacity than the rest of the highway, and if getting light rail to Vancouver is so damn important than the best option would be a new BNSF bridge with light rail and four lanes of traffic. It would be cheaper, provide an emergency route, and give local access to Hayden island.

[westsider]

Double post.

[urbanlife]

actually I agree with a local bridge connecting vancouver, hayden island, and portland. Would be easy to run light rail through that and help with the revitalizing of hayden island. Plus in doing that, might reduce some of the traffic crossing back and forth.

The key thing to that working would be the rising cost of gas would convince people living in vancouver that commuting by train is a much better way to go. A 12 lane bridge I dont buy, I do understand the need for better highway systems for shipping of goods, which has been the reasoning for much of our interstate growth throughout the country, but I am curious if reducing the dependency on the current bridge would be better fit.

Also, they could build the local bridge without disrupting traffic crossing the I-5 bridge, which makes much more sense. Plus it wouldnt hurt having a third crossing for the Columbia.

Minus the light rail, I think they way they are going after getting this bridge and the reasoning for its size is the "old" way of thinking about transportation. That and I feel like if Vancouver wants to be apart of this metro then they need to start acting like it, I have no problem cutting vancouver off from everything and making them suffer. They serve little importance to the portland metro.

[MarkDaMan]

^bleh, not all of them. A dense Vancouver with a vibrant downtown would be beneficial for the region. It's painfully obvious Beaverton is going to take their time coming to terms with their proximity to Portland and their need for upwards growth.