Supporters of building a Metrorail line to Washington Dulles International Airport through a tunnel under Tysons Corner have withdrawn a lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Transportation that sought to block the approved project if their proposal wasn’t reconsidered, the group’s president said Tuesday.
Tysonstunnel.org’s suit said the Federal Transit Administration couldn’t approve funding for the 23-mile line’s first phase to Reston because the construction contract wasn’t bid competitively and the underground route wasn’t adequately weighed as an alternative to the proposed aerial track in Tysons.
It was an eleventh-hour attempt to force the tunnel back into the debate after Gov. Tim Kaine rejected the idea as too expensive in 2006. But now that the FTA appears on the verge of denying $900 million in federal funding for the project, which would kill Dulles Rail, Tysons’ tunnel.org president Scott Monett said the lawsuit was no longer necessary.
“They seem to be doing what is best for not only the taxpayer but also the public interest for other transportation projects, which is fair and open competition for any project receiving federal dollars,” he said. “At the end of the day, as long as they continue to hold that position, and this project is eventually competitively bid, there is no reason to pursue litigation at this time.”
The public-private partnership that forms the backbone of the project has been the subject of contention for years, and state officials have been consistently forced to fend off accusations of creating a ‘no-bid’ project.
Defenders point to the fact that the proposal was advertised in Virginia newspapers, and that only two firms – Bechtel Infrastructure and Washington Group International – responded. The two companies were folded into a consortium, Dulles Transit Partners, and eventually given the contract.
