Rail Critics Toss Heaps of Wool at Your Eyes; Talk Show Host Relies on the Old ‘Bait and Switch’

Where to begin? Sunday’s anti-rail commentary in the newspaper demands more response than we gave it yesterday, and then there’s the radio host who used the piece to fill two of his hours this morning.

Half-truths, misleading conclusions, obfuscations – they’re all in the inventory routinely used by these anti-railers as they attempt to pull the wool over the public’s collective eyesight and use a little bait-and-switch while they’re at it.

Let’s do begin with the radio host, who invited rail supporters to “look at what’s been advanced in this piece. If this is dead wrong, I would highly recommend that you make it wrong, because….this particular piece is going to be at the heart of how the general public forms its opinions about the rail project.”

As we wrote yesterday in our dissection of the piece, everything in the Gang of Four’s commentary was old news. We likened it to a desperation Hail Mary pass by the losing team near the end of the game. And since nothing’s new, Oahu residents already have sifted through those anti-rail arguments and said in three different scientific opinion polls that they support rail. The show’s host says the surveys weren’t objective, but what else can he say? It’s the only way anti-railers can deal with the results!

The True Objective

Mixed in with callers who are in complete agreement with the host (when they do call, which isn’t often) was “Roger” from Kalihi, who challenged the host’s anti-rail commentary and even flustered him a bit. Paraphrasing:

“I’ve heard all the suggestions – contra-flow highways, building more lanes on the freeway (about as hair-brained as you can get), more buses – and none of them will work. We have to make a bold decision to build something out there…. Traffic is almost unlivable. We’ve got to embrace change, and we’ve got to have the rail. The ultimate objective is to give people an alternative to get out of their cars and give people something else to get to and from the city.”

Note that last sentence (a quote, not a paraphrase) and what Roger said was the “ultimate objective” – providing an alternative to congestion. Here’s where the radio host employed bait-and-switch:

“If you do build this project, you will not achieve your objective, which is alleviating congestion. Will there be an option? Yes. Will it alleviate this congestion? No, so why move this project forward?”

The host completely ignored Roger’s ultimate objective – which in fact is one of the project’s major goals – and substituted his own. Roger had boxed him in by accurately saying what the project can and will accomplish, leaving the host no alternative but to blame rail for something it and nothing else likely can do over the course of the 21st century – reduce traffic to the point that it’s no longer an aggravation. As Roger implied, rail system riders will eliminate that aggravation from their lives.

Had Roger been more familiar with the project, he might have said rail will indeed alleviate traffic by attracting 40,000 drivers out of their cars by 2030 to ride the system. Even Cliff Slater had to admit this at a July 2010 City Council hearing when he said: “We don’t disagree at all that the rail will have an effect on reducing traffic congestion what it might be if we did nothing at all.” (We can’t get enough of that quote and use it often.)

Wool Gathering

The newspaper commentary’s authors are comfortable with misstatement and obfuscation. After complaining that “the city is planning to provide parking at only four of the 21 stations,” they posed their unintentionally humorous question: “Where will commuters park their cars?”

That mournful query said a ton. They just don’t get that cars eventually won’t be a necessity for scores of thousands of commuters who, without rail, would have to drive. Rail will be part of a public transit system, with buses providing a convenient and inexpensive option to driving and giving commuters access to and from the rail spine.

They'll ride rail for reasons we covered a few days ago when reviewing the Brookings Institution’s conclusion that among 100 metropolitan areas across the country, Honolulu’s public transit system ranks #1 in transit’s coverage of the community and the access it provides workers to their jobs. TheBus already is a success; a better transit system can only be even more successful.

Spreading It

The Gang of Four says rail will cost more than the city’s projected $5.3 billion, “but the facts indicate otherwise.” Facts? Cost overruns in cities thousands of miles away don't make it a “fact” that Honolulu will overrun, too.

Neither does the so-called “independent study by the highly regarded IMG group” partially written by a rail critic – a study so transparently partisan the current governor ignored it and the current mayor called it “an appalling waste” of taxpayer dollars and an “anti-rail rant.”

Be on guard when this group of authors starts to throw around “facts” and statements like this in the commentary: “No wonder virtually every environmental group in Hawaii opposes heavy rail despite the city’s false claims that it would be a ‘green’ project.”

Here’s a statement from the Sierra Club’s Oahu Group website:

“The Sierra Club Oahu Group supports the Fixed Guideway (rail) alternative. The Fixed Guideway alternative provides what Oahu needs most: an alternative to the automobile. Oahu residents have become overly dependent on private automobiles, and this dependence has devastating effects: reliance on fossil fuels, pollution and global warming, traffic congestion and the resulting loss of productivity, consumption of more land for roadways and parking, and negative impacts on public health and community life. The Oahu Group believes these are urgent problems that require a major shift in our transportation habits, and therefore supports the development of a rail system on Oahu."

Maybe Roger of Kalihi is a Sierra Club member. We don’t know, but we can accept as “fact” that the local chapter of the Sierra Club, which certainly qualifies as an environmental group in Hawaii, supports Honolulu rail – just one more thing the Gang of Four doesn’t want you to know.

(This post has been added to our "aggregation site" under Cliff Slater.)

Lawsuit Backers Switch Tactics, Blast Honolulu Rail in Media Broadside Aimed at Influencing Public Opinion, but Absolutely Nothing Is New

Newspaper headline writers attempt to capture the essence of stories to help readers get into the piece or avoid it altogether, depending on their interest. We’ve tried to do that here at Yes2Rail today about yet another anti-railer attack in the Honolulu Star-Advertiser’s editorial section today (subscription required).

The commentary purporting to show how the city has misled the public on Honolulu rail has the fingerprints of Cliff “Always By Car” Slater all over it. Former Governor Ben Cayetano, former Judge Walter Heen and UH law professor Randall Roth are along for the ride. These three gentlemen profess no transportation expertise, so they’re relying on Mr. Slater for guidance in trying to influence the public, something he has failed at. They’re also plaintiffs in a federal lawsuit with an unambiguous goal: “If we prevail,” their commentary reads, “the rail project will be halted.”

The weakness of their newspaper presentation is apparent in the first paragraph, where journalists traditionally draw readers into their stories, commentaries and editorials with solid information and facts about what lies within the piece itself. But that’s not the case in today’s anti-railer attack.

This one starts off with an allegation that public relations firms are responsible for hoodwinking the public into giving the project strong support in three scientific opinion polls conducted since 2008. It  amounts to an admission that Mr. Slater and friends have been unsuccessful in convincing the public that rail should not be built.

“We’ve failed up ‘til now,” we can imagine them saying in their strategy session, “so this time let’s throw everything we’ve ever used at the project and see if something finally sticks. Maybe blaming the public relations people might work.”

Really? PR people are responsible for the public’s overwhelming endorsement of rail? If that’s the best they can do, it’s pretty weak, but it gets weaker the deeper you read. Let’s break it down by examining some of the allegations.

Recyling, Recycling

The first thing to note is that there’s nothing new in this piece. You can find proof of that at Mr. Slater’s own website – HonoluluTraffic.com. Scroll down and you’ll find the same graphics carried in today’s newspaper; the street scenes comparison was posted on July 18th, and the rendering of the Bishop Street and Nimitz Highway station has been used repeatedly at HawaiiReporter.com, one of Mr. Slater's third-party anti-rail sites (search there for “Slater”).

• About those “aircraft carrier” rail stations: It’s a spurious exaggeration meant to obfuscate and confuse, one of Mr. Slater’s favorite tactics. The project’s website says the station platforms will be 240 feet long, shorter than Mr. Slater’s claim that stations will be “270 feet long and 50 feet wide.” How does that compare to actual aircraft carriers? The U.S. Navy says Nimitz Class carriers are 1092 feet long and 134 feet wide – 4.55 times longer than a rail station. Even using Mr. Slater’s exaggerated width, carriers are more than two-and-one-half times wider.

• Blame it on the consultants: Keep in mind as you read through the newspaper piece that nowhere does it offer any alternative to the rail project, nor does it dispute the project’s goals, which realistically can be met only with a grade-separated transportation mode, like elevated rail. So in the absence of any substantive contributions, the authors attempt to stain the project by innuendo – first with vague allegations about PR agencies and then contractors Parsons Brinckerhoff and InfraConsult.

Every project with costs running into the billions of dollars encounters detractors and attention-grabbing journalists (we’ve had both here), so to suggest Honolulu rail is tainted by what a company did on another completely different project a continent or more away is weak. Even the reference to the H-3 freeway is weak in light of the Fasi Administration’s dogged resistance during the years it fought the project to a standstill. You can find “Cliff Slaters” everywhere – fighting against progress, defending the status quo, or in the case of our own Mr. Slater, advocating more highways and toll roads.

• That old chestnut? Mr. Slater works his repetitious and thread-bare argument into the “Stacking the deck” section of today’s commentary. He wants the reader to believe he forced City transportation director Wayne Yoshioka into admitting something shameful, something that should be hidden – that “traffic congestion will be worse in the future with rail than what it is today without rail.”

Does common sense have a place in Mr. Slater’s world? Of course traffic will grow in the future with the population. As Mr. Yoshioka told the City Council in July 2010, “No kidding, in the future, traffic will be worse than it is today. I don’t think that’s any earth-shattering news.” He said that because Oahu’s population is projected to increase by 200,000 in 2030 compared to 2005 (more on that below). With population increase comes more traffic.

And here’s the kicker that puts Mr. Slater’s commentary into proper, disreputable perspective: At that same Council meeting, Mr. Slater said this: “We don’t disagree at all that rail will have an effect on reducing traffic congestion from what it might be if we did nothing at all.” In other words, as Mr. Yoshioka told Council members, “…without the rail in the future, traffic congestion will be much worse than with the rail, and I think that’s the whole point of the discussion."

Yes, that is the whole point – but it’s one Mr. Slater won’t admit unless he’s forced into a corner, as he was at the Council meeting. His anti-rail presentations are intellectually dishonest in the extreme, as his interview with Civil Beat last year revealed.

• About Oahu’s growth: Today’s commentary says the city has “cherry-picked data” to estimate Oahu’s 2030 population. “It relies upon a 2004 30-year population forecast even though the 2008 30-year population forecast indicates 100,000 fewer people in 2030 than was previously forecasted,” the plaintiffs write.

Let’s see what the 2010 census found: According to the U.S. Census Bureau, Oahu's growth over the past decade kept pace with the project’s projections. See for yourself at our February post. Mr. Slater has been silent on what actually is happening on Oahu, preferring instead to obfuscate as usual by focusing on the theoretical.

We could go on and will in future Yes2Rail posts. What stands out about this commentary is the lawsuit plaintiffs’ own apparent doubt about the success of their efforts. They’ve filed a lawsuit but know they've lost the public opinion battle, so they’re taking their case to the streets again with the same tired arguments that have failed to gain traction for all the years this project has been progressing.

They want to stop a much-needed public infrastructure improvement that’s supported by a solid majority of citizens based on what they’ve read, learned and absorbed about Honolulu rail – both from critics and supporters. It’s a desperate gambit by the losing team – a prayerful Hail Mary pass. We’ll see plenty of them in the coming football season. Mr. Slater's Gang of Four no doubt is conjuring up more desperation Xs and Os for use against Honolulu rail.

(Today's post has been added to our "aggregation site" in the Mr. Cliff Slater section.)

Saturday Review: Institute’s Transit-Accessibility Study Shows Why Rail Will Be Successful Here

We’re taking a second look at the Brookings Institution’s study of transit coverage and job accessibility in metropolitan areas across the country (see the end of yesterday’s post for the first).

Oahu residents have grown accustomed to hearing good things about TheBus, Honolulu’s well-regarded transit system, but it’s something else to read it in a nationally respected organization’s detailed study. Some quotes on Honolulu are worth pulling out, because they offer insights on why Honolulu rail will have such great appeal to a population that already relies heavily on a good transit system and will embrace an even better one.

• Honolulu, a region with long-standing urban containment policies, highly constrained geography and a relatively centralized employment base, posts the highest share (of jobs accessible via transit) at 60 percent, nearly double the 100 metro-area average.

• …most Western metropolitan areas rank among those with the highest (transit) coverage rates. Fully 97 percent of Honolulu’s working-age residents live in transit-covered areas, as do 96 percent of those in Los Angeles and San Jose.

• Large metro areas such as San Jose, Denver and Portland, as well as mid-sized areas such as Honolulu, Salt Lake and Tucson, posted among the highest scores thanks to strong rankings on both transit coverage and job access.

• Only 18 (out of 100) other metropolitan areas’ headways (time between vehicles during rush hour) are below 10 minutes… Half of these are in the West, including Portland (7.4), Denver (8.1), Honolulu (9.0) and Tucson (9.2).

• Metro areas with a high number of transit commuters, such as Los Angeles, Honolulu and Philadelphia, also stand out for having small per capita carbon emissions due to transportation compared with more car-dependent areas such as Nashville and Oklahoma City.

This graphic summarizes Honolulu’s ranking among 100 metro areas and can be used as a cudgel on arguments that “rail will never work here,” a favorite anti-railer assertion. Transit already works exceptionally well here due to obvious geographical constraints and job concentration.

Honolulu’s elevated rail system will provide fast, frequent, reliable and safe transportation for a population already well served by public transit. Honolulu’s future transit system will integrate the rail guideway “spine” with TheBus’s enhanced network, reducing headways and increasing job accessibility for current transit users and attracting tens of thousands of car drivers once cost and convenience advantages become obvious to them.

Also obvious with each new scientific opinion survey on Honolulu rail, most Oahu residents are supporters. The Brookings study helps us understand why the solid majority knows intuitively that rail is needed and will work here.

(Today's post has been added to our "aggregation site" in the Project's Goals and more section.)

Advice during APEC Meet: ‘Stay Off the Roads’; Honolulu’s TheBus Ranks 1st for Access in USA

It’s Statehood Day in Hawaii, a holiday for the sizeable state and county workforce. The road sounds drifting up from the nearby thoroughfare are noticeably muted compared to a normal weekday, but traffic is always on the minds of Oahu drivers.

One has asked the Star-Advertiser’s transportation columnist whether the routes of dignitaries attending the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting in November (a big deal here) will be known in advance. Street and highway closures to accommodate visiting presidents, princes and potentates are especially bothersome in Honolulu’s long and narrow urban corridor.

Predictably, their routes won’t be advertised for security reasons. Writes columnist Gene Park (subscription):

“The best advice I can give is to think about what route you would normally take from the airport to Waikiki, and avoid that same route at all costs. There aren’t that many ways into Waikiki, so use your best judgment and stay off the roads.”

Stay off the roads? That’s good generic advice to avoid traffic jams but impractical for countless employees who must be out on them to do their jobs.

Now, what if there were an alternative to using streets and highways to travel through the urban core – something that moved travelers quickly from place to place without a care in the world about surface congestion? It would provide fast, frequent, reliable and safe transportation day or night, rush hour or holidays, dignitaries be darned.

That something, of course, will be Honolulu’s elevated rail system, which is scheduled to begin full operations between East Kapolei and Ala Moana Center in 2019. Visiting dignitaries and their staffs who want to do some high-end shopping while in Honolulu could head straight to the shopping center from the Airport station by train and avoid all of us on the streets below.

We’re Number One!

The Brookings Institution has published a report that finds Honolulu is far better served by the city’s transit service – TheBus – than transit in most other cities across the country.

Here’s Honolulu’s “Transit Accessibility Profile” as compiled by Brookings:

Honolulu ranks #1 among 100 metropolitan areas in the study’s category that combines Coverage, Service Frequency and Job Access. That has a lot to do with our population concentration along the coastline, and that has a lot to do with why Honolulu rail will be a success.

City Cautiously Advances Rail, Queries Ansaldo

The City’s contract with Ansaldo is on the agenda of the Honolulu Authority for Rapid Transportation (HART) today. Two committees will meet jointly at 9 am with an agenda that includes a briefing and discussion on the Core Systems Procrement process.

With the State having dismissed appeals by losing bidders Sumitomo and Bombardier, City attorneys have cleared the project to move ahead barring a court-ordered injunction on the Ansaldo contract. Bombardier sued the City earlier this week over the dismissal of its bid early in the process.

HART’s Project Oversight Committee will meet at 10 am to review rail’s monthly progress report, receive an update on property acquisition for the route and discuss the committee's areas of responsibility.

The City has asked Ansaldo for additional information on its parent company's financial strength in light of recent comments by its CEO regarding Ansaldo's performance.

58.7% to 38.3%

These percentages are the average results from three scientific public opinion polls on Honolulu rail in 2008, 2009 and 2011 showing overwhelming support for the project among residents.

As the political season intensifies, any politician running to represent the 1st Congressional District, which encompasses the system’s 20-mile route, presumably will factor these results into the campaign. Failure to endorse the rail project wholeheartedly would be at odds with public opinion and likely result in electoral support much closer to the lower figure than the higher.

Rail Critic’s Latest Reads Like More of the Same

Cliff Slater will tell you what lies ahead for the Honolulu rail project. Just ask him – or don’t ask him and he’ll write something somewhere to tell you anyway, and while he’s at it, he’ll try to start a debate that most of us feel was decided long ago.

Take his latest broadside against the Honolulu Authority for Rapid Transit (HART). Mr. Slater never met an agency or authority or office associated with Honolulu rail that he liked, and HART’s no exception.

Oahu citizens overwhelmingly approved HART’s creation in an affirmative vote to amend the City Charter last November, passing the measure 63.6 percent to 29.1 percent. When blank votes are set aside, the "yes" vote was 68.6 percent, a landslide in anybody’s book and not much less than Senator Daniel K. Inouye’s usual reelection dominance (71.9 percent).

But that matters not to Mr. Slater, who’s still battling against HART and trying to convince us that it was formed for reasons other than why the voters approved it – to remove rail from the ever-fluid world of elective politics and have it administered by a semi-autonomous body. As the Honolulu Star-Advertiser editorialized on June 23:

“The whole reason for taking control of the dedicated transit fund away from a political body (the City Council) is to keep decisions in the hands of those not seeking campaign contributions, and to ensure that they’re based on professional reasoning, not politics.”

Mr. Slater doesn’t see it that way. In his world, HART was created “to shield elected officials from the harsh criticisms that will well up from voters when the cost overruns and ridership shortfalls occur and consequent increases in property taxes are needed. Then the mostly anonymous HART appointees will take the flak.”

He can see it any way he wants, but this is classic Slater – conjuring up a universe in which (1) HART exists for a reason of his own choosing, not the public’s, and (2) anticipating a dismal future for Honolulu rail that springs entirely from his own anti-rail tendencies that go back decades. Repeat something often enough, he apparently reasons, and maybe it’ll stick. (For more on Mr. Slater’s ongoing anti-rail campaign and his dubious reasoning, visit our July 26th “aggregation post.")

As usual, we’ve linked today's post to Mr. Slater’s latest views on HART, since we believe the more exposure he receives, the better Honolulu rail looks.

Wayne Yoshioka Talks Transportation at CB

Director of Transportation Service Wayne Yoshioka’s interview with Civil Beat was streamed “live” online and came off with only one 30-second audio drop. Here's a close approximation of the exchange, transcribed as it happened. Civil Beat has posted the entire interview on its site.

Questions by Mike Levine: What’s the city doing to relieve congestion?

A: One of the biggest of course is the rail project. We don’t anticipate building new facilities/highways, so we have to make it more efficient to move people.

Q: Nothing new in highway construction?

A: State is looking to open up some bottlenecks, in the Middle Street area, for example, and an am/pm contra-flow lane. Shifting all this traffic to other modes is important. Buses also get caught in the congestion, and that’s why we’re looking at grade-separated transit that doesn’t get caught in the congestion.

Q: Bombardier’s actions? 

A: It’s a prescribed process. Bombardier talked about taking the legal route, and we’ll just have to wait to see how it plays out.

Q: Is there anything preventing the city from signing the contract with Ansaldo? 

A: My understanding is that there’s nothing technically standing in the way. We’ll have to see how it plays out.

Q: Concern about Ansaldo worldwide. How does that factor in now? 

A: It’s been discussed through the whole procurement process. The rulings speak for themselves. The procurement process was proper, and we can move on if we’re allowed to do so.

Q: What’s your role with the Honolulu Authority for Rapid Transportation? 

A: Explained what his role is in HART…sits as an ex-officio member of the board, but I want to stress that these are my own comments that I’m expressing here today.

Q: How’s the relationship between the Administration and the rest of the HART board? 

A: It’s a very cooperative relationship, like all departments. We have close relationships with all city departments and the state. Everything is interrelated with transportation, so all agencies have to work together; otherwise, we’re working against one another.

Q: Will there be surfboard racks on the train? 

A: We haven’t made the decision about surf racks, but we have said we’ll initially allow surfboards on the trains, monitor it and go from there.

Q: The route? Are you satisfied that the current route will service enough of the community to help enough people? 

A: The project will be completed before we know it. It’s a good route, from East Kapolei and the UH West Oahu campus all the way to the Ala Moana Center. The intent is in the future, should funds be available, we’d extend it to UH Manoa, West Kapolei, and elsewhere perhaps. The current route does provide a solid backbone on which we can build.

(Sound was lost during a question  about the bike program.)

A: …We’re not going to build the entire bike program all at once. We want to have a good plan for incremental improvements to get to the ultimate plan. When that’s done, we’ll have a good path to get it done.

Q: Waialae Avenue in Kaimuki….an opportunity to implement the plan as roads are improved? 

A: In Kailua, our staff had been looking at the Keolu Drive area and had polled the neighborhood about reducing the lanes to two to liberate space for bike lanes. Regarding Waialae Avenue, we hadn’t moved along as far as in Kailua; the Waialae project was sorely needed, and the timeframe didn’t match up with ours. We were still studying it. We’ll be closing down one of the five lanes on Waialae and cone it off to test the concept of making space for a bike lane. We always make sure everyone’s comfortable with what we’re intending to do, but the resurfacing project came before we were ready to do this. We have in fact prepared to put down pavement markings to alert motorists that they can expect to share the space with bikes. That’ll happen as we go forward.

A: What’s happening with the Complete Streets program? 

A: Complete Streets says you have to respect all modes of travel – not only cars, but pedestrians and bikes, too. Generally, Complete Streets isn’t a program for new areas; we already plan to put them in with new streets. The real issue is in the established streets and areas. Transit-Oriented Development will enable us to implement Complete Streets in those station-focused areas. We’re formulating a Complete Streets policy for the entire County, then we’ll take it to the Council. That’ll guide our activities for the future.

Q: Street traffic lights sometimes change to "go" but there’s no walk signal. What’s with that? 

A: To clarify the signal issue, the reason why we ask pedestrians to press the button to trigger the walk signal is that we require a certain clearance level – 3 to 3.5 feet/second, a leisurely pace that allows them to step off and get across if they push the button and step off before the flashing begins. When the flashing already has started, you should not be stepping off into the street. In heavy pedestrian environments, we’ll have the Walk sign set automatically, but in most other areas, the pedestrian needs to push the button. The solid hand tells you you shouldn’t be walking.

Q: Retro-fitting some areas to make them more modern? 

A: It’s a function of what was done much much earlier than when I came on in 2007. It’s easy to second-guess things that happened in the past. Honolulu was originally designed before there were cars. Streets were designed for horses and buggies. I can’t see criticizing people back then for doing that. We have to look at ways to take what we have and make it more pedestrian-friendly.

Q: Any examples of old decisions that have made your life easier? 

A: Things that really helped were when certain promenades were planned with enough width to give us flexibility as we retrofit. Land is at a premium here, so another approach we’re looking at is viewing corridors rather than individual roadways. Maybe it doesn’t make sense for every street in an area to have bikeways. Hopefully we can do that without disrupting the historical significance of much that we have in Honolulu.

Q: Federal lawsuit on the FEIS. One of the major gripes in the lawsuit is that rail will have major impacts on historical sites. 

A: In the process that was followed, our procedures were very prescribed by the federal rules. The FTA’s response speaks for itself. All the alternatives that were studied are in the FEIS. It’s a very complete document.

Q: In terms of price, given financial crises in the US and Italian governments, some are saying the project should stop.
A: We have a very conservative financial plan. We’re not hanging by a shoestring. Second, we have tremendous support in both the administrative and legislative branches of the federal government. It’s to the country’s advantage to look at ways to make transportation more efficient, and we’re doing that here and are well-positioned to take advantage of the climate.

Q: Your relationship with Parsons Brinckerhoff; given your position…can the public trust this project? 

A: Absolutely. Everything is above board. First, back in 2007 a lot was made that I came from PB, but PB was already aboard, so I didn’t bring them. Secondly, the directors are not involved in selecting consultants like PB. We think the best-qualified candidates rise to the surface. PB deserves to be there. It’s an excellent firm, and I learned a lot and it’s benefiting me in my job now.

Q: Is there a way you or the Administration can reach out and communicate better with the public? 

A: We try to do that. There’s an extensive public information process—a weekly show on `Olelo, appearances at neighborhood boards and other community events, newsletters. We’re trying to do that across all the departments. We’re adding more information on-line for the public.

Q: Some viewers have concerns about construction. 

A: We’re meeting with other departments on how we can put more information out there online so people can see it. It needs to be organized so people can understand it.

Q: What comes next? There’s been mention of a “toll cordon” around downtown, and smarter parking meters. 

A: First about the cordon around downtown Honolulu. It’s tied somewhat with the concept of managed lanes, or toll roads. The whole point of tolls is to influence travel demand. If it gets expensive enough, people will be less inclined to use the car. We have to be very careful about that. Some people can’t afford tolls. We’re certainly not trying to force someone to use one mode or another. We have to be very careful about making life harder for people.

Q: Parking hikes downtown would influence people’s decision to go there, presumably. 

A: We currently have an RFP out for advanced parking devices. We’re out there soliciting them so we can implement some innovative approaches. San Francisco is experimenting with dynamic parking rates. If parking is at a premium in an area, parking rates would rise, and they’d go down elsewhere where there was less demand. We also could put information up on the web so people could tell where the parking is less expensive and available. People would spend less time looking for parking and save money, too.

Q: Other areas are growing on the island…Hawaii Kai, North Shore. Are there ways to increase the capacity of single-lane roads to some of these areas? 

A: Some communities talk about it, but on the other hand, there are just as many in these communities who don’t want the road capacity increased. We’re trying to keep the country country. It might not be consistent with that policy to increase the road capacity. The state is considering a bypass around Haleiwa that would make it easier for people to get around very congested areas when there are events on the North Shore.

Q: Wrapping up, do you think the solutions you’re talking about today will be good for Honolulu in 10 to 50 years? 

A: I’m benefiting from the work that occurred years ago. If that hadn’t happened, our issues would be far far worse. Moving on, we’re excited. We’re developing a Joint Traffic Center, co-housing all traffic-related agencies. Active Traffic Management is the plan. We don’t foresee much widening of existing roadways or building new ones, so we have to manage our existing roadways better. We’ll have to do that to address the future needs of our road system.

Bombardier Takes Case to Feds, Circuit Court: 'Wayne’s World' To Be Focus of On-Line Chat

Bombardier, one of the two losing bidders to supply the Honolulu rail project with rolling stock and operational expertise, is appealing its loss to both the Federal Transit Administration and state circuit court.

The company has swung twice and missed so far. The city disqualified its bid earlier this year as non-responsive, after which Bombardier appealed unsuccessfully to the state.

“Bombardier is hugely disappointed it was never afforded the chance for a full hearing to present evidence and testimony to tell the real story…,” a company statement said.

Bombardfier says it will ask the FTA to terminate the contract award to Ansaldo and also will file a lawsuit over the city’s procedures.

Noon Interview

Director of Transportation Services Wayne Yoshioka will be Civil Beat’s newsmaker today at noon, HST. The online subscription news service allows “occasional visitors” to drop by without paying for the privilege, so the interview should be accessible to everyone at this page.

Mr. Yoshioka provided answers to five preliminary questions last week.

State Makes It Final, Rejects Sumitomo Appeal; Comprehending Elevated Guideway as Essential

Once upon a time it seemed only Senator William Proxmire (D-WI) had enough media savvy to make news on the weekend. His “Golden Fleece Awards” on government waste always seemed to break on a Saturday or Sunday, and he made headlines while other politicos were asleep at the switch.

Not so anymore. The State Department of Consumer Affairs chose Sunday to post the final decision of Hearings Officer David Karlen to reject Sumitomo Corporation’s appeal of a major Honolulu rail system contract to Ansaldo of Italy.

Karlen’s decision is long, but some media boil it down to a sentence or two. Hawaii News Now says the contract award to Ansaldo “was not unreasonable based on Sumitomo’s allegations.” Civil Beat has a longer story.

Sumitomo and the other losing bidder, Bombardier, still have the option to appeal to circuit court.

Essentially Elevated

The federal defendants provided their response on Friday to the lawsuit filed by several individuals and entities to block construction of Honolulu rail. At least two of them have learned something about slow-news weekends; one distributed a press release on Saturday commenting on the response, and anti-railer-in-chief Cliff Slater posted about it on his website yesterday (look for 8/14).

We stay clear of commenting on the lawsuit itself, but the objection to elevated rail by the project’s opponents, including some plaintiffs, is fair game.

We’ve added a few photographs in our photo column at right showing one of the major disadvantages of at-grade rail compared to elevated. They speak for themselves, but for added emphasis, we’ve also reproduced (below) the links found at our July 26th “aggregation post,” a “one-stop site for pro-rail talking points.” Numerous other issues are posted there as well.

Every city with at-grade rail has had to contend with train-vehicle collisions, even Norfolk, VA, where the city’s new 7-mile at-grade line goes into revenue service a week from today. Without carrying its first passenger, "The Tide" already had its first collision with a car last Thursday.

Spend some time with these previous Yes2Rail posts, and when you do, try to imagine how an at-grade system in Honolulu’s exceptionally dense and narrow urban environment could provide fast, frequent, reliable and safe service. It couldn’t.

You may not like elevated rail's looks; that's a personal thing, but as a travel option that will completely avoid all traffic (and collisions) while achieving the project's goals, it's beautiful.

Elevated vs At-Grade – It keeps coming up, the view that at-grade rail would be a better option than Honolulu’s planned elevated system. We’ve taken pains to address the comparison numerous times:
• What Every Consumer Asks When Making a Purchase: ‘Will It Do What I Need It To Do?’
• Jogging & Keeping Pace with an At-Grade Train
• Among At-Grade’s Negatives: Vehicle Lane Loss
• Among At-Grade’s Negatives, Part 2: Accidents
• When Safety Is Crucial, Think Elevated Rail
• Train Meets Van in Another At-Grade Rail Collision
• Phoenix Citizens Want to Know ‘What’s the Problem with All These Crashes?’
• Architects Are Trying To Squeeze Through the Eye of a Needle with a Claim At-Grade Rail Is as Safe as Elevated
• At-Grade’s Drawbacks Can’t Be Airbrushed Away
• Human Factor Causes another At-Grade Crash; Bus Runs Light, Smashes into Houston Train; 12 Sent to Hospitals, Rail Service Halted for Hours
• Car-Train Crash in Long Beach Illustrates Major Drawback to 'Cheaper' At-Grade Rail Transit
• Yet To Open, Norfolk's Train Has First Car Crash

Saturday Review: Feds Respond to Lawsuit, DKI Says Funding Solid, another At-Grade Collision

The workweek ended (does it ever?) with word that the federal defendants in the lawsuit to stop Honolulu rail have responded to the suit and its allegations. As Civil Beat reported yesterday, the response makes for pretty dry reading unless you’re an attorney. This is typical of almost every paragraph:

“The allegations in paragraph 3 contain statements of jurisdiction to which no response is required. To the extent a response is required, Federal Defendants deny the allegations in paragraph 3.” And: “The allegations in paragraph 54 purport to characterize the NHPA and its implementing regulations, which speak for themselves and are the best evidence of their content. Federal Defendants deny any allegation contrary to the plain language, meaning, and context of the NHPA and its implementing regulations.”

That seems plain enough, and we now await developments in court. The City already responded to the lawsuit.

At-Grade Pilikia

Norfolk, VA is taking justifiable pride in The Tide, an at-grade rail transit system that begins its official run next Friday. It recorded its first car-train incident on Thursday in a hit-and-run collision, hopefully not the first of many, although that could be hope against hope. At-grade systems around the country have racked up numerous accidents with vehicles; Phoenix recorded 52 in its first year of operation. Elevated Honolulu rail will record none. Norfolk understandably is emphasizing accident prevention at its website with a “Safety Starts with You” campaign. It’s therefore ironic that a photo cycling through The Tide’s home page shows the kind of track encroachment that leads to accidents:

Senator Inouye Says

We reported this week on the encouraging words of Senator Daniel K. Inouye (D-HI), who has represented Hawaii in Congress continuously since statehood was granted in 1959. Chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, the Senator told reporters this week Honolulu “can count on” the federal funding in the project’s financial plan.

That stands out as the best news of the week.

Yet To Open, Norfolk’s Train Has First Car Crash

The point made two days ago here in posting about Norfolk’s new light-rail at-grade system – “Something you'll never see from Honolulu's train: Cross-traffic.” – literally hit home yesterday when a car crashed into The Tide during a test run. Said WAVY-TV’s news anchor: “This morning’s accident was bound to happen sometime, but this occurred sooner than anyone thought....”  Inevitable in Norfolk, maybe, but we’ll say it again: That kind of accident will be impossible with Honolulu rail until the day cars start flying. Our system will be elevated. (Above, WAVY-TV's video shows workers repairing the damage; watch the video to see a reporter's investigation of when and how often trains approaching an intersection are required to blow their horn. Quiet, The Tide is not.)

Q&A with Honolulu Transportation Chief Yoshioka On Federal Rail Funding, Bike Program, TheBus

This site relies on links to numerous online sources, and Civil Beat, the Honolulu-based subscription news service, is a frequent “contributor.” Civil Beat has lost some of its uniqueness now that many other news outlets, including the Honolulu Star-Advertiser, charge for their content, but CB’s content is still exceptional, with no advertising accompanying its in-depth reporting that’s unconstrained by column length. As a subscriber since CB’s launch in April 2010, we recommend it to anyone with a strong interest in public affairs here; the current promotion has cut the subscription price in half.

Yes2Rail is read at a distance by many who aren’t likely to subscribe to Civil Beat, so we hope our long introduction will help smooth the way for our extensive quoting of today’s content at Civil Beat, recently judged by The Society of Professional Journalists Hawaii Chapter to be the “Best Overall News Site.”

Wayne Yoshioka, Honolulu’s Director of Transportation Services and ex-officio member of the Honolulu Authority for Rapid Transportation, will be at Civil Beat’s offices next Tuesday for an online conversation about Honolulu’s Transportation future. These questions and answers are at CB today as a prelude to Tuesday’s session. (He's shown testifying at a City Council hearing on Honolulu rail in July 2010.)

1. Last month, control of the city's $5 billion transit system was transferred from the Carlisle administration to the semi-autonomous Honolulu Authority for Rapid Transportation, for which you sit on the board. What will this mean for citizens as they monitor progress of the project?

Please keep in mind that I am answering the questions as the Director of the Department of Transportation Services. I do serve on the Honolulu Authority for Rapid Transportation (HART) as a voting ex-officio member, but my answers to the questions posed by Civil Beat regarding the Honolulu High-Capacity Transit Corridor Project (HHCTCP) only reflect my opinion and not that of the entire HART board.

The citizens of Honolulu will continue to receive the extensive level of public information that the Rapid Transit Division provided when it was part of the City and County Department of Transportation Services. The RTD and now the HART budget includes support for very significant public information efforts that include a web site, a regular program on Olelo (public TV), periodic news releases, outreach at major public events, and regular reports to neighborhood boards. HART is committed to open and transparent operations and communication of project news and decisions to the public.

2. The project is dependent on $1.5 billion in federal funds. The Federal Transit Administration has repeatedly voiced support for rail in Honolulu, but the climate in Congress is tricky right now. What makes you so confident that you'll be able to secure the federal funding?

Support for funding the Honolulu’s rail project remains strong in both at the executive and legislative branches. The Obama Administration included a significant level of funding for the project in the FY2011 and FY2012 budgets. We received the budgeted amount of $55 million in an FY2011 appropriation in spite of the overall decline in the total funding available for the New Starts program. The federal transit funding program is a competitive program based on a project’s merits so a solid and good project like ours does well in the competition.

3. Much of the conversation these days is about rail, but that's only one piece of the transportation picture. What can you tell us about the city's implementation of bike plans to make Honolulu safer and friendlier for cyclists?

The update of the Oahu Bike Plan is planned for release in October 2011. The Bike Plan expands the 1999 Bike Plan from the urban area of Honolulu to the entire island of O`ahu. The updated Bike Plan stresses connectivity as a major goal. Additionally, the plan is prioritized to focus efforts on areas with high bike demand. A truly multi-modal approach was used in developing the update, including identifying connections between bike facilities and transit stations for the planned Honolulu High Capacity Transit Corridor Project (HHCTCP). A key improvement in the update Bike Plan is the inclusion of interim projects. The ultimate Bike Plan is impressive, but it will not be built overnight or all at once. There needs to be incremental improvements made in working toward the ultimate plan and that is what the interim projects provide. DTS is coordinating with other City agencies such as DDC and DFM to maximize the efficient use of taxpayer dollars. An example is the Keolu Drive bike lanes which were completed as part of the Keolu Drive roadway resurfacing project for very little cost over the cost of the resurfacing project.

4. Even with rail, buses will continue to be a major part of the city's public transportation planning. There's some concern that money needed for the bus system will be diverted to rail. What would you tell people about that concern? Will people still be able to take their favorite bus to work and will it be in the kind of condition that our buses are today?

The City and County of Honolulu is absolutely committed to maintaining a strong bus system during and after construction of the Honolulu High Capacity Transit Corridor Project (HHCTCP). The financial plan for the HHCTCP identified the use of a portion of formula funds (FTA 5307 funds) that have traditionally been used for bus programs as part of its federal funding. It is hoped that, as in the recent past, the contract costs for construction of the HHCTCP will continue to be less than estimated in the financial plan. As contracts are executed and as the design of the HHCTCP is finalized, it is believed that the FTA 5307 funds will not be needed.

5. A lawsuit has been filed in federal court challenging the environmental review. It claims the city didn't adequately consider alternatives. What do you say to people who believe at-grade light rail, bus rapid transit or hot lanes would have been a better solution for Honolulu's traffic problem?

I believe all viable alternatives were considered through the project development process. People can easily look up the reports and other documents that support the City Council’s decision in selecting a grade-separated fixed guideway system.

To that last point we’d add our own recommendation to those who are curious why Honolulu's system will be elevated along its 20-mile route. Visit our “aggregation site” for links to nine Yes2Rail posts on why elevated rail is far superior to surface rail in this city.

A Bus by Any Other Name Is Still a Bus; Flooding Oahu Streets with Them Is No Solution to ‘Chaos’

"Lord, won't you buy us a Mercedes-Benz?"

The new plan floated in Honolulu Weekly to solve Honolulu’s mobility problem is built on the premise that adding more buses to our streets and highways is the way to go. More buses! The plan by a local marketing guru has inventiveness going for it, but let’s be clear about something: Dave Cheever, whom we know to be a good and likeable guy, is a marketing guy, not a transportation guy.

From the HW piece’s outset, it’s clear Dave’s “Grand Plan” takes aim at the “Road Gang” and its grip on the neck of Oahu’s driving public. The Gang’s members are “car companies and their dealers, oil companies, tire manufacturers, civil engineers, road paving companies, etc.”

We’ll bullet-point our way through the article with quotes that seem worth calling out.

• Dave calculates that $20 million is spent locally on advertising “to encourage people to buy and/or drive a car…. That’s free enterprise, which has very, very successfully convinced us that we should have as many cars as we want and be able to drive them wherever and whenever we want. The consequence, however, has lead directly to the constant traffic chaos on Oahu.”

So far, so good. What he calls “chaos” we call the ever-growing traffic congestion on the major arterial roads that run east-west to and through the urban core, such as the H-1 freeway, Nimitz and Kamehameha highways, Beretania and King streets and others. East-west is how the mountains and ocean have squeezed Honolulu’s development, and it’s on those surface roads and highways where the so-called “chaos” reigns as commuters pack them morning and evening.

• “Spending $20 million to court consumers into cars is a dazzling amount, especially compared to the zero dollars spent on marketing us into our bus system. In a way, this scene is shocking, because when you think about it, it’s surprising there is any ridership of TheBus.”

We have to hit the brakes here. TheBus system is one of the nation’s best and has the nation’s sixth highest per-capita ridership. Riders choose TheBus for numerous reasons – out of necessity (no car ownership), thriftiness (good value compared to driving), convenience (TheBus goes where they want to go). In other words, the marketplace has made TheBus an attractive choice for large numbers of residents, and that’s not shocking at all.

• “Regardless of what we may believe, we cannot build our way out of Oahu’s transportation mess by continually spending millions to widen lanes or by constructing an elevated toll roadway.”

Agreed! There’s no room to build more highways on Oahu, and toll roads would just be added to the cost of driving, but not for everyone. Only the well-to-do would use them, leaving the rest of us trapped in surface congestion.

• Dave then switches to the heart of the Grand Plan – to buy “gorgeous” Mercedes-Benz buses for Oahu. “Seriously, that way a spouse leaving in the morning can say, ‘Honey, I’m taking the Mercedes to work.’ Think about it. Mercedes can build these buses with leather seats. No tacky ‘TheBus’ signs on these vehicles. They would be painted in real Mercedes colors….” Some routes would have “uniformed attendants,” free newspapers and Starbucks coffee, he writes.

This is probably a good place to drop in a photograph of a Mercedes-Benz bus:

“What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.” ~Shakespeare 

 Translation: “What matters is what something is, not what it is called.”

Dave Cheever goes on to describe a fleet of 400 jitney-type Mercedes buses that would service the valleys and neighborhoods and carry passengers to bigger buses on the long-haul routes. Riding all these neighborhood buses would be free, and fares for the long-haul buses would be 25-50 cents, which poses what he calls “the hard part.”

Freedom Fuel

• “How are you going to pay for the big ones and the small ones, too? The attendants? The wireless Internet? And all that other stuff…? The key ingredient in the Grand Plan is called Freedom Fuel…. Under the Grand Plan, Freedom Fuel (gasoline) would cost about $7.50 per gallon, which is just what gasoline costs in most of the rest of the world…. If this pricing mechanism is successful and individual car use drops by one-third, the $3.00 over the current price would generate an estimated $300 million to fund the Grand Plan. That revenue totals 100 million gallons times $3 per gallon.”

You can read the HW article repeatedly if you want, but you won’t find any more explanation about how the Freedom Fuel mechanism would work than what’s in the above paragraph. Apparently, one-third of current drivers would be priced out of driving and forced by economics to ride the Mercedes-Benz buses. The other two-thirds would pay a $3 premium for every gallon of gas they buy to fund the buses, the free coffee, the free Internet access, the on-board attendants and the free bus rides themselves.

Dave Cheever deserves points for inventiveness, and maybe his marketing proposal would fly in notoriously dictatorial locales like Singapore, but on Oahu, it hasn’t a chance. Artificially inflating the cost of driving a car or anything else in high-cost Hawaii is about the last thing Oahu residents would accept.

Gasoline is highly likely to cost upwards of $7.50/gallon by the end of this decade due to traditional market forces, and that’s one reason why Honolulu rail will be an attractive alternative for potential riders. An estimated 40,000 fewer cars will be off the road in 2030 with rail as a viable option for the anticipated 116,300 weekday ridership.

We’ll end our assessment of Dave’s HW piece by disagreeing with two points made near its end. He asserts that once rail construction begins, “traffic will be tied up not for hours, but years. I repeat – years.” That’s simply not true, which will be evident once the builder’s traffic-mitigation plans are better known.

Dave also says Honolulu rail will be much more expensive than the plan and will take longer to build. It looks like he buys the anti-railers’ mantra, but there’s nothing to substantiate that assessment beyond rail opponents' belief systems.

‘Nobody Will Ride’ Honolulu Rail? Nonsense; Ask Commuters in Cities with Rail-Based Systems

"The Tide" begins serving Norfolk, VA this month.

We return to this issue frequently because anti-railers such as Cliff Slater, Panos Prevedouros and their followers keep repeating the same assertion: Nobody will ride Honolulu's rail system when it goes into full service in 2019. Oahu residents are so wed to their car-dependent lifestyles that the city’s projections (116,300 daily riders in 2030) are wildly off – or so their thinking goes.

It’s a bizarre position to take in light of the millions who ride rail in cities all over the world, including Los Angeles, a city they still position as anti-transit. LA's successful and expanding rail system says otherwise.  Do people still drive cars in these cities? Of course they do, and those who don’t want the hassle of driving take their train.

“It gives me 30 minutes of peace,” says Bridget McCall of her daily trips on the new light rail line in Charlotte, NC. “It beats sitting in traffic, I save gas and I don’t have to pay for parking. I love it.”

McCall and other Charlotte commuters shared their commuting experiences using the city’s system with the Virginia-Pilot newspaper in Norfolk, VA, which is about to open its own light rail line this month.

Familiar Opposition

Neither city is free of dissension over rail, as the article makes clear. A former Charlotte city councilman who led the fight to repeal the transit sales tax is quoted saying much of what we hear locally – “It’s a loser, a real loser. There’s no way Norfolk can afford it…. Sure, light rail gives people a choice, but at what cost? How much is Norfolk willing to pay to give people a choice?”

That’s the anti-railers’ main issue – the cost vs choice argument. Die-hard opponents can never see a justification for the cost, but supporters can’t imagine a workable future without giving commuters that choice – an alternative to sitting in traffic, wasting time, burning gas, polluting the air, etc.

Says Bob Morgan, president of the Charlotte Chamber of Commerce:

“Light rail sends a powerful message to the companies here and the companies looking to come here. We are investing in our future so our workers have options for getting to work. Transit is not a luxury; it’s a necessity. It sends a message and symbol of how you as a community are thinking about the future.”

Skate shop owner Josh Frazier reflects that optimism:

“It’s made the neighborhood more accessible. I’ve seen increase in interest in the area, more shops and condos. It’s a great thing – very progressive and environmentally friendly.”

Chuck Berger, owner of a gourmet store, says:

“It’s helped change people’s opinions on mass transit. Now everyone wants it in their neighborhood.”

Norfolk’s “The Tide” rail system begins full service on August 22, with free rides for the public the preceding weekend. Be sure to turn your sound down when you click on the YouTube video at the newspaper’s website. The first thing you hear are loud train whistles and bells, necessary warning devices for at-grade rail systems that mix with pedestrians and vehicles. Elevated Honolulu rail will have no such need.

Something you'll never see from Honolulu's train: Cross-traffic.

Inouye: Honolulu Can 'Count On' Federal Rail $$s

Honolulu rail has a friend in Congress who says federal funding for the project is safe as long as he has anything to say about it.

He, of course, is Senator Daniel K. Inouye (D-HI), the longest-serving member of the United States Senate and chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee. Residents joke about saying prayers for DKI’s health each night, but it’s no joke that Senator Inouye is in the inner circle of power people in Washington and wields enormous influence over where federal dollars are sent around the country. He’s known for ensuring that large numbers of them come to Hawaii.

Home from the capital during the August recess, Mr. Inouye held a press conference yesterday and said Honolulu “should count on” the $1.55 billion in federal funds it’s planning on for the $5.3 billion project.

“I will most certainly discuss this matter with the appropriate committee,” Inouye said – his typically understated way of saying “it’s a lock.”

Bombardier Pondering

Bombardier, one of the three firms to submit a bid on the Honolulu rail system, is still thinking through its next steps after receiving its latest rejection slip.

The city dismissed the company’s bid, and Bombardier appealed that action to the state Department of Commerce and Consumer Affairs. The hearing officer rejected that appeal, and now the company says it will “seriously consider” going to court over the latest rejection. Civil Beat has posted Vice President Andy Robbins’ statement.

Houston’s Highway Traffic Is Nation’s 4th Worst

As we noted Saturday, rail critic Cliff Slater uses Houston’s transit system as a predictor of failure for Honolulu’s rail project. His reasoning is that as a percentage of daily trips, transit’s share today is lower than 10 years ago, and if that’s true for Houston, Honolulu can't hope to hit its ridership targets. Mr. Slater ignores all factors that could explain this statistic, including Houston’s love affair with the automobile.

The map of Houston posted on Saturday shows it’s sliced, diced and surrounded by arterial highways, proof that Houstonians response to mobility issues was to build more of them. With so much highway concrete out there, residents opt to drive rather than ride.

We found another explanation that rings true – the dispersal of job centers throughout the greater Houston region. One website (unfortunately not bookmarked and now not findable) said only 7 percent of the region’s jobs are in the urban center; it listed numerous other employment centers and said Houston’s rail system can’t connect to them all. People simply drive.

How have the abundant highway choices served the city’s citizens?

Houston’s traffic congestion is the nation’s fourth worst, according to the latest Urban Mobility Report. Compared to what’s called “normal drive times,” drivers there on average waste 58 hours a year in traffic at a collective cost of billions of dollars in additional fuel expense and more than $1,300 individually.

Oahu jobs are concentrated in two places – downtown Honolulu and the island’s Second City on the ewa plain. That’s how the City’s General Plan has guided our growth for decades, and that’s why Houston is not a predictor of anything about Honolulu’s future rail line. It not only will connect our two employment centers and the other communities along its 20-mile route, Honolulu rail will deliver its passengers on time and congestion-free each and every time they ride.

Saturday Review: Sumitomo Protest Continues, Ansaldo CEO Resigns, Critic Rolls Out Statistics

Houston's classic hub-and-spoke highway system.

Rail critics are heartened by any news that’s short of brilliantly positive for the Honolulu project, so Sumitomo's protest of the city’s award of the car manufacturing and system O&M contract to Ansaldo cheers them up. Even cheerier was the resignation of Ansaldo’s CEO amid reports of corporate turmoil.

But what really gets chief rail opponent Cliff Slater going is any opportunity to slice off a thin layer of statistics and use it as proof that rail transit is failing all around the country and will fail here, too. (See our aggregation site for past discussions of Mr. Slater’s approach.)

Mr. Slater’s latest post at HonoluluTraffic.com (dated July 29th) observes that “Houston has 20 percent less bus and rail transit riders today than it had 10 years ago when it had only a bus system. This has happened despite building a rail transit system and having a 26 percent increase in population…. Should Honolulu be worried just because other rail lines have only achieved 60 percent of the ridership their cities had forecast? You bet.”

This is classic Cliff Slater – floating a statistic without any context, explanation or background and then standing back to let it sink in. (See his July 2010 interview with Civil Beat for a typical example.)

Honolulu Isn’t Houston!

We decided to compare Houston and Honolulu for their geography and the highway systems that have been developed to serve both cities. Houston’s layout is at the top of this post; Honolulu’s is below.

Thankfully, Honolulu isn’t Houston, and we can be glad, but we must admit that Houstonians do have it all over Oahu residents in one category – highway options. It's impossible to over-emphasize the contrast.

Houston suburbs stretch for miles in every direction. The city’s freeways provide multiple highway alternatives for residents to reach their destinations. Here’s a portion of what Wikipedia says about Houston’s highway system:

"Houston freeways are heavily traveled and often under construction to meet the demands of continuing growth. Interstate 45 south has been in a continuous state of construction, in one portion or another, almost since the first segment, the Gulf Freeway—Texas's first freeway—was opened in 1948…. Houston has a hub-and-spoke freeway structure with multiple loops. The innermost is Interstate 610, forming approximately a 10-mile-diameter (16 km) loop around downtown. The roughly square "Loop-610" is quartered into "North Loop," "South Loop," "West Loop," and "East Loop." The roads of Beltway 8 and their freeway core, the Sam Houston Tollway, are the next loop, at a diameter of roughly 25 miles. A proposed highway project, State Highway 99 (The Grand Parkway), would form a third loop outside of Houston, though some sections of this project have been controversial. As of 2007, the completed portion of State Highway 99 runs from just north of Interstate 10, west of Houston, to U.S. Highway 59 in Sugar Land, southwest of Houston, and was completed in 1994. The next portion to be constructed is from the current terminus at U.S. Highway 59 to State Highway 288 in Brazoria County."

We could go on, but why bother? Houston’s dissimilarities with Honolulu’s long and narrow urban corridor bounded by mountains and the Pacific Ocean are so great they're almost laughable.

Even transit backers acknowledge that the privately owned automobile is usually the first preference when travel options are compared. Texans are probably the most independent-minded of all Americans, or so they tell us, and are first to demand and defend their right to drive their own cars anywhere they want. They wanted highways, and it’s highways they have.

West Oahu residents have one freeway linking them to downtown – ONE! – and options to build more are slim to none. We live on an island and are happy to be here, but traffic is bad and getting worse. Even the Texas Transportation Institute says Honolulu has some of the worst congestion in the country.

So Mr. Slater’s statistics gambit once again is exposed for what it is – an intellectually dishonest attempt to sway public opinion on Oahu by using Houston’s experience as a predictor of failure for Honolulu rail. He would have made as much sense comparing Honolulu to Jupiter or Mars.

One freeway links west Oahu's Second City with Honolulu.

There's no better example of what near-total reliance on a single freeway can mean than the September 6, 2006 mishap on Honolulu's H-1. The gridlock was so big and so bad that some motorists abandoned their cars and walked. Others drove to the windward side and around the entire island to get home. Still others spent the night in a hotel. Had Honolulu's rail system been in operation, tens of thousands of commuters would have made the trip home on time and without incident.

Worsening Traffic Congestion Can Drive Us Crazy; Researchers Say Unpredictability Makes It Worse

It's the unexpected delay that really gets to us.

Spend any time with transit- and commuting-oriented websites and you come across information generated around the world that resonates right here on Oahu.

Two Swiss economists did a study a few years ago and identified a condition they called “the commuting paradox” – that in choosing where to live, people consistently underestimate the pain of a long commute. As SeedMagazine.com reported:

“This leads people to mistakenly believe that a mansion in the suburbs, with an extra bedroom and sprawling lawn, will make them happier, even if living there might force them to drive an additional 45 minutes to work. It turns out, however, that traffic is torture, and the big house isn’t worth it. According to the calculations of (the scientists), a person with a one-hour commute has to earn 40 percent more money to be satisfied with life as someone who walks to the office.”

How does that resonate, Oahu commuters?

SeedMag observed that traffic flow unpredictability is what really gets to us and that “if traffic were always bad, and not just usually bad, it would be easier to deal with.”

Reducing the aggravation factor is nearly every commuter’s goal, and traffic engineers and planners are working on it continuously. Here at Yes2Rail, we’re always quick to point out that when a commuter chooses to switch from driving to riding grade-separated transit, the traffic aggravation factor is reduced to zero.

Grade separation is the key. By being elevated above surface streets and highways, Honolulu’s rail system will provide commuters with congestion-free travel that’s fast, frequent, reliable and safe.

You can download the Swiss study and read about the commuting paradox at your leisure. Here are a couple bullet points from the study’s concluding section:

• “We find a large negative effect of commuting time on people’s satisfaction with life. People who commute 23 minutes (one way), which is the average commuting time in Germany, would have to earn 19 percent more per month on average in order to be fully compensated.”

• “For many people, commuting seems to be a stress that doesn’t pay off.”

Audience: ‘Tell Us More about Bus Connections’

One of Appendix D's many bus routing maps.

“How will people who want to use rail get to the stations? I think this information should get out there now so people can learn what the bus plan is and maybe have a good reason to look forward to riding the train.”

That’s a paraphrased comment from Tuesday’s Honolulu rail presentation at the Ohana Honolulu Airport Hotel, where participants had numerous suggestions and questions about the project. One of them concerned ridership projections, which we covered yesterday.

Until Tuesday, it’s been sufficient to describe the future bus-rail interface as a hub-and-spoke relationship, with station-hubs along the 20-mile elevated line and bus route-spokes feeding into them.

Appendix D

The Final Environmental Impact Statement (found at the project’s website) is the go-to document for detailed information on the Honolulu rail system, including bus routes in 2030. That’s the target year for much of the rail planning, although the entire line is expected to be completed and operating by 2019.

You’ll find Tables in the appendix for existing and future bus routes, including coverage, frequency and routing between transit centers, rail stations and routes to and from neighborhoods. Information covers which routes will be eliminated due to the speedier rail service covering the same territory, where new routes will operate and the current and future route frequencies.

Here’s a sample of what’s in Table D-1, Changes/Additions to Local Bus Service with Implementation of the Project – 2030:

New Route 312 – connecting Moanalua Valley with Salt Lake and the Airport. Service will operate 10 minutes in peak and 30 minutes in midday periods. Mauka bound from the airport the route travels Paiea, left to Aolele, right on Rodgers, right on Nimitz, left on Camp Catlin, left on Arizona, left on Salt Lake, right on Ala Lilikoi, right Ala Ilima, left on Ala Napunani, right Ala Aolani, right Moanalua, left Ala Kapouna, left Moanalua to serve the Kaiser Foundation Hospital, left Ala Napunani, left Ala Aolani to Ala Aolani and Ala Uwila. The return trip follows from Moanalua Valley via Ala Aolani, right on Moanalua (again serving Kaiser), left Ala Kapuna, left Moanalua, right Ala Napunani, right Ala Ilima, left Ala Lilikoi, left Salt Lake, right Arizona, right Camp Catlin, right Nimitz and left on Rodgers to rail station.

This is typical of Appendix D, so if it's detailed information on bus routes you want, Appendix D is where to find it.

Feedback Is Critical Element of Project Outreach; Airport-Area Audience Asked about Ridership

Rail system's airport station will be an easy walk to nearby employment centers. 

The Honolulu rail project gives a couple hundred or more presentations each year to community groups, private companies, service clubs and other organizations. It’s tempting to think we’ve heard and answered every conceivable question after all that outreach – tempting but not the case.

The folks at the Ohana Honolulu Airport Hotel did some outreach of their own by inviting neighboring businesses to send representatives to yesterday’s rail project presentation at the hotel. The session prompted numerous questions from the participants, some of them new to the presenter, and the project will be responding to each one individually.

As we promised the group yesterday, our Yes2Rail topic today addresses one pertinent comment, which is paraphrased: “Why do you think your ridership projections are accurate, and how will you ensure you reach your goal of attracting passengers to the train?”

Attraction Is the Key

Ridership forecasting is discussed at length in section 8.6.3 in the Final Environmental Impact Statement (available at the project’s website), and we’ll get to some of that below.

Honolulu rail will successfully achieve the projected 116,000 daily riders in 2030 by offering clear advantages to potential users in two areas – cost and convenience. We’ll leave the latter for another day and focus for now on the expense of commuting by car, which includes fueling it, of course, as well as insurance, maintenance and parking costs.

The AAA has calculated the per-mile cost of driving a car each year since 1950. Back then, when gasoline sold for 27 cents per gallon, driving a car 10,000 miles a year cost the owner 9 cents per mile.

The AAA’s 2011 report used $2.88/gallon as its basis for gasoline costs, so right from the start you know where this is headed. Here on Oahu, the average price of regular gas today is $4.044, nearly a dime more than a month ago.

The "Paradise Tax" we all pay for the privilege of living here translates to just about everything else that goes into calculating the cost of living, including driving. If the AAA says the composite average for vehicles driven 10,000 miles per year is 76.3 cents across America, then we can be certain the cost on Oahu must be close to $1 per mile.

Someone living in West Oahu with a 30-mile round trip commute to work in town is incurring in only two days the same cost as a monthly pass for TheBus. The future cost advantages of rail rapid transit – which will be faster than drive-time commutes on the H-1 freeway – is obvious even today, and we have to believe driving expenses will increase dramatically over the next decade.

Ridership Forecasts

Chapter 8 in the FEIS discusses how forecasts have been achieved using modeling techniques that the Federal Transit Administration says “is conducted to ensure ridership figures are realistic and to avoid past errors by other projects where, in some cases, forecasts exceeded actual ridership performance….”

The section continues:

"The model (for Honolulu) is based upon a set of realistic input assumptions regarding land use and demographic changes (City policy regarding where growth will be oriented over time and trends based on economic factors and population changes) between now and 2030…. Based upon the model and these key input assumptions, approximately 116,300 trips per day are expected on the rapid transit system on an average weekday in 2030.”

The FEIS notes that modeling involves uncertainty and therefore discusses the project’s uncertainty analysis. If you’ve not yet dipped into the document for detailed information on Honolulu rail, Chapter 8 on Comments and Coordination is one place to start.

We’ll address the convenience angle tomorrow to explain why many people stop driving their own cars and start riding rail transit with a description of how TheBus will link with the rail's 21 stations.

Federal Issues Aside, Local Posturing Still Ahead

We can’t let Saturday’s headline sit atop this blog any longer in light of recent developments in Washington, so we’re updating the site and hope the fear to which it alluded has indeed been wiped away.

There still are plenty of reasons to be wary of issues and how they’re covered in the media here in Honolulu. The Civil Beat and Star-Advertiser stories today don't shed much new light on the Honolulu rail project and therefore are likely to be forgotten by tomorrow, but some media content deserves longer attention. Charles Djou's commentary in this week’s edition of Pacific Business News is an example.

Mr. Djou’s piece manages to keep him in front of PBN’s readers all week, which is reason enough to mention it at least twice in this space -- especially since, as we pointed out in Saturday’s post, it's built on an exceptionally shaky foundation.

We hope you’ll take a moment to read Saturday’s post, and if you have an opinion one way or the other, leave a comment by clicking the link.