Quick Action Alert: Tell Moore to End the Toll Lane Project ASAP

We still don’t know what Governor Moore will do about Larry Hogan’s private toll lane plan. Take action today to urge Moore to end the scheme and choose from the array of effective alternatives already on the table.

Click here to reach the “Share Your Ideas” form on Moore’s website. (You will need to use your Google account or create one.) Select “transportation” as your policy area and tell the Governor why you want him to end the toll-lane project now. If you’ve written before, it’s fine to write again.

For background:

• Look at the NY Times’ Widening Highways Doesn’t Fix Traffic. So Why Do We Keep Doing It?, including this: “If you keep adding lanes because you want to reduce traffic congestion, you have to be really determined not to learn from history…”

• Skim through the articles in DontWiden270.org's past newsletters.

• See the City of Rockville’s detailed objections to the toll lane project, gathered here.

• Consider how the project will take from the many, only to benefit the wealthiest few and the shareholders of MDOT’s private partner, Australian toll-giant Transurban.

Moore’s inspiring directive requires the end of the scheme

Photo: State Highway Administration, on WMAR (emphasis added)

Rejecting the toll lane project is the only choice consistent with Moore’s signature motto: “Leave No One Behind.” If our governor acts on his own wise words, no one will be left behind: not economically, not in worsening congestion, not in health and safety, not in a damaged environment and diminished communities.

Thank you for taking action. Watch for detailed toll-lane project updates in the coming weeks.

ACTION ALERT: Help Moore Make the RIGHT Choice About Toll Lanes

We have a job to do. Governor-elect Moore’s latest comments on the toll-lane scheme are encouraging. But he hasn’t yet said he’ll actually stop the project and pivot to smarter, better options (see “Good Alternatives to a Really Bad Idea” below).

He may have only a short window to make that announcement. If his administration lets Transurban keep working toward a construction contract, he risks getting mired in the private-profit scheme. The risk is similar if his administration tries to modify, rather than stop, the project (see “There’s No Fixing This” below).

If -- on the other hand -- he announces the end of the scheme ASAP, he shows he means to keep his transportation promises from the start of his first 100 days. Our job is to strongly encourage him to take that step (see Action Item below).

The Governor-elect’s promises are undermined by the toll-lane project

See what his policies will be up against if the toll-lane plan is allowed to continue.

• Equity vs. tolls that go up by 2.1% “PLUS the annual consumer price index inflation" each year (p. 356).

• Environmental protection vs. the devastation documented here.

• Partnering with local jurisdictions vs. MDOT shrugging off the City of Rockville’s intense opposition.

• Fiscal stewardship vs. a $9B project lacking independent legal/financial analysis.

• Safe roads vs. an estimated accident increase of 42% at MD’s I-495 ramp terminals if toll lanes are built (per MDOT, p. 323). The greatest increases would be at River Road and Old Georgetown Road.

There’s no fixing the toll lane scheme

 All the bad parts are built in. The project’s for-profit component requires ongoing congestion in the free lanes to “force” enough people onto the toll lanes. It requires sky-high tolls to maximize revenue. It requires new bottlenecks to promote future toll-lane expansion. It requires taxpayer compensation to cover revenue shortfalls. And it requires opacity because no logical case can be made that the project benefits the public.

Action Item

Urge Governor-elect Moore to announce the end of the toll lane project now. His transition website is inviting the public to send him ideas. It’s a welcome chance to write him about the toll lanes. Click on the “Share Your Ideas” form here (use your Google account or create one), select “transportation” as your policy area, and let him know what you think.

You can explain how the plan will affect you and your community, or why you don't want for-profit toll lanes that serve the wealthiest few. Write about the processes’ many flaws or the enormous harms the project will bring. You’ll find more ideas and links in DontWiden270.org's past newsletters.

 We want our new governor to know that the determined, grassroots opposition to the toll lanes is on his side. We’re ready to support him as he calls for the toll-lane scheme to end.

Gov.-elect Wes Moore addresses Dec. 16 MoCo legislative breakfast via Zoom. Photo by Bruce DePuyt, Maryland Matters

Good alternatives to a really bad idea

According to a recent interview, Governor Hogan said he is “unhappy that he’ll leave office with his plan to increase capacity on the Beltway and I-270 still up in the air. He’s urging Governor-elect Wes Moore to get it done. ‘It absolutely has to happen or it will be catastrophic for the Washington area.’”

No. Alternatives to Hogan’s plan are numerous and promising, and in the public interest. Here are some:

• Expansion of MDOT’s own Innovative Congestion Management System, which has virtually eliminated congestion on lower I-270 below I-370

• More MARC train service on the Brunswick Line

• An extensive bus-rapid transit network

• Reversible lanes, particularly on upper I-270

• Policies that encourage telework and transit-oriented communities

Hurry-Up-and-Wait; New Gov/New Day

Quick status update:

• Time’s running out for Gov. Hogan to get a toll-lane contract OK’d before he leaves office (see “MDOT vs. the Calendar” below).

• If he tries for lame duck approval of the deal, the outcry will be enormous (see “Tip the Scales” action item).

• If he can’t beat the clock, the project’s fate is up to Governor-elect Wes Moore.

• Moore has consistently said he opposes the project as proposed.

• Given his emphasis on equity, transparency, and public participation, we believe he’ll ultimately reject this mess of a P3 in its entirety.

• We also believe he’ll champion equitable, effective, environmentally smart alternatives to the boondoggle.

• But until the Hogan toll lane scheme is permanently withdrawn from state consideration, public activists – that’s all of us plus advocacy organizations plus our allied elected officials – will keep forcefully opposing the harm.

MDOT vs. the calendar (looks like calendar wins)

 

The Hogan administration has four chances to try and jam a contract through the Board of Public Works before inauguration day, January 18: BPW meetings on 11/16, 12/7, 12/21, and 1/4.

But consider all that’s supposed to happen first: As-yet unmet regulatory requirements for 60-day review by the Maryland National Capital Park and Planning Commission, a 30-day legislative review, and contract review/approval by the Maryland Transportation Authority.

Then there’s the contract itself. It doesn’t seem to be ready. Less than a month ago, the CEO of MDOT’s private partner Transurban told shareholders “the project has a long way to go” and Transurban is “now working with [a construction contractor] to drive value and efficiencies in the project's design, pricing, and delivery… to submit a … proposal and execute a design and construction contract.”

And looming over all are the Federal lawsuit to “halt the…toll lane project because of an insufficient and error-filled environmental review”; a losing bidder's lawsuit challenging MDOT’s contract award to Transurban; and the US Army Corps of Engineers’ consideration of MDOT’s flawed and controversial water permit application.

ACTION ITEM: Tip the scales

 

The Sierra Club of Maryland, the National Resources Defense Council, and the National Trust for Historic Preservation are leading the new federal lawsuit to stop MDOT’s toll lanes. Until the current toll-lane project is withdrawn from state consideration, this critically important lawsuit must continue.

It takes money to fight a project backed by BIG money. Our side is up against the resources of the Hogan Administration, PACS, highway lobbyists, contractors, developers, and international conglomerates. Please help tip the scales with a tax deductible donation to the "Maryland Smart Growth Defense Fund.” Thank you!

What rolling investigation reveals…

MDOT’s rationale for the toll lane project (congestion relief at no cost to taxpayers) has always been an illusion. That’s why the tens of thousands of pages MDOT has released to the public rely on illusionist tactics: misdirection, deception, opacity, confusion.

But our expert partners continue digging into the documentation and uncovering outrages. The latest example comes from Arthur Katz in his recent submission to the US Army Corps of Engineers.

Among his many important points: “There’s no justification for the proposed actions on I-270”, in large part because of the effectiveness of MDOT’s own I-270 Innovative Congestion Management (ICM) Project (p. 6).

Since 2017, MDOT’s ICM has used roadway and safety improvements and innovative technology to nearly eliminate congestion on I-270 below the northern bottleneck at I-370.

• According to Arthur Katz, ICM “will successfully address many of the traffic issues on I-270 over the next 25 years without the MDOT toll lane project.”

• “ICM will make a major contribution to reducing congestion on all of I-270, not just the study area” (p. 5).

Note to federal and state decisionmakers who green-lighted the incredibly damaging and congestion-promoting toll lane scheme: The success of Maryland’s ICM project shows what could have been and should be a most viable alternative.

Photo by Angela Breck. Maryland Matters, 11/12/22.

Equity and tolls and inflation, oh my…

We know what inflation does to the cost of tomatoes and gas and rent. Here’s what it does to the toll rates for MDOT’s shamelessly inequitable project. In 2021, the Maryland Transportation Authority approved an annual maximum toll escalation rate of 2.1% “PLUS the annual consumer price index inflation” (p. 356). Imagine this year’s 7% inflation rate tacked onto the sky-high tolls we already anticipate, should this project ever be built.