High Speed Rail: Only a few days left

Guest post by Ray Taylor, President, Future of Hampton Roads

The formal, federal Public Comment period ends next week on the 11th of February.

There are still two ways remaining for individuals, companies or organizations to participate in the decision-making process, and they are:

1. Best method: Mail in your individual or organizational letter (a public comment input). This is the best course of action to ensure your input gets into the federal record. These letters must be received by 11 February (the end of the official federal public comment period). The address is:
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   Public Information Office
   Department of Rail and Public Transportation
   600 E. Main Street, Suite 2102
   Richmond, VA 23219
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2. Make an electronic comment input over the Internet: Go to http://www.rich2hrrail.info/ and then Click “Comment on Draft EIS”, bottom of page (take your time; do it well). This electronic form has 5 pages with 6 questions, an excellent procedure.

It is incredibly important for Hampton Roads “to catch up” and “to get back into the game”.

Certainly, there would be more national value for a genuine high speed rail line serving the region of Hampton Roads than for one serving the Tampa Bay Metro Area, but unfortunately, Tampa will be funded long before us. Chalk that up to a lesson learned. Put on your boots, take the time and send in comments to the Draft EIS, not only you, but your spouse also, and your neighbors, your company and your colleagues.

It is best to have well written and serious individual letters that include your unique and personal views rather than having stock or standard, fill-in-the-blanks letters.

Still, everyone seems to request some assistance. What follows is a list of key issues that have been developed by the Future of Hampton Roads organization for you to consider. Three or four of these points may interest you. Those points along with your own views should help you send in a mailed letter or to make an electronic input.

1. Support the Hampton Roads Transportation Planning Organization’s (TPO) historic and valuable Resolution of last October that called for the Route 460/Southside corridor to be “designated as the High Speed Rail Corridor” and that called for eventual speeds of “more than 110 mph”. Alternative 1 in the EIS reflects this plan and design, so select Alternative 1 when responding to the electronic comment form and select 110 mph.
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2. Ensure the EIS establishes the long term design level and that it plans and provides for “true high speed rail”. The plan for Hampton Roads HSR should clearly describe an explicit long-term outcome that meets or exceeds the 110 mph minimum required to qualify for federal HSR funding. This final design must be explicitly documented in the Final EIS (FEIS). This is needed to ensure that any interim construction projects designed for slower speeds will be compatible with the long-term plan. This requirement will ensure that scarce transportation funds are not wasted on a short-term system that would have to be rebuilt. Along the way, we do not want to spend money twice.
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3. Ensure that the Hampton Roads corridor has a compatible design and will have equivalent levels of service as those already established for the Southeast High Speed Rail Corridor to which we will be connected.
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4. Fund the Virginia High Speed Rail Crescent first and fund rail to North Carolina second. Funding for construction of the Hampton Roads HSR system should be given priority over Southeast corridor routes south of Petersburg. This preference is justified objectively by Hampton Roads’ status as a major port, Virginia’s largest tourist destination, and the nation’s “Pentagon South,” with a ridership likely to exceed any other Southeast corridor metro area. Virginia should recognize the merits of and focus on funding what we are calling the “Virginia HSR Crescent” from DC through Richmond and Petersburg to Suffolk and Norfolk.
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5. Ensure Through Service. The Rail to Hampton Roads EIS should explicitly document a federal commitment to assess options for eventual through service both north and south at junctions with the Southeast corridor main line at Petersburg, and the selection of the connecting train station in Petersburg should be made with this criterion in mind. Travelers to and from Hampton Roads should not have to change trains to access the Southeast corridor main line.
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6. Launch EIS for future southwest rail route. The Rail to Hampton Roads EIS should explicitly include a federal commitment to conduct an Alternatives Analysis and Tier I EIS (AA/EIS) for potential HSR passenger service to the southwest from Suffolk via Weldon NC to Raleigh in order to serve the population of Northeast North Carolina who are an integral component of the Hampton Roads metro area and to reestablish more direct contact with the NC Piedmont area. As a future concept, this additional track would provide a long desired travel method to the southwest and it would create an HSR loop off the Southeast corridor main line similar to the loop already approved for Winston-Salem in NC.
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7. Update the data in the EIS. The data used in calculating financial estimates for the various EIS alternatives should be updated. Much of the data in the EIS dates from 2004, excludes defense department input, and assumes a third crossing that is not likely to be built. Revised cost, cost-benefit analyses, and ridership estimates must be used in documents submitted to federal authorities and properly archived if our region is to compete effectively with other metro areas for limited federal funds.
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8. Fix the Peninsula line now. The valuable TPO Resolution called for an upgrade of the Peninsula’s AMTRAK passenger rail line, and this should be pursued on an urgent basis. This AMTRAK line already exists and already has a prescribed level of design, however, the current levels of on-time-performance (OTP) and quality of train stations and train platforms is entirely unsatisfactory. Peninsula AMTRAK is not subject to a long and onerous federal EIS assessment process. The work that needs to be done can be done now. This work list of grade crossing improvements, added lengths of second track passing sidings, train station improvements, signaling and barrier upgrades needs to be compiled, prioritized and urgently entered into the region’s 2030 Plan which will be Amended (Updated) soon.

Our grass roots goal is to generate 2,000 public comment inputs before 11 February. We want a better and a stronger EIS. We want to explain the great value and the incredible importance of Hampton Roads to the decision-makers in Richmond and Washington, DC. We do not want to be left out of the picture any longer. We need; the nation needs for Hampton Roads to have “true high speed rail”.