The Federal Transit Administration agreed Monday to give Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine until Friday to rebut the agency’s severe criticisms of the Dulles Rail project, providing a small reprieve for officials scrambling to save the project.
Kaine was expected to respond Monday to FTA Administrator James Simpson’s Thursday letter on why the extension of rail to Dulles won’t qualify for $900 million in federal funding. Simpson’s statement almost certainly signals the death of the project in its current form, though advocates remain hopeful.
Not only is the project too expensive to meet federal cost-benefit standards, but its manager, the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority, is inexperienced with large-scale rail projects and its eventual operator, Metro, doesn’t have enough funds to maintain it, Simpson wrote.
The Kaine administration argues the FTA made no mention of the last two problems prior to Thursday, which Simpson disputes.
Kaine announced the time extension with an air of optimism that had been missing from the discussion in recent days.
“We look forward to advancing our case for the Dulles Rail project, and advancing the project into final design,” said Kaine’s spokesman Gordon Hickey.
Kaine also has secured an agreement with the rail’s contractors, Bechtel Infrastructure and Washington Group International, to prevent a multimillion-dollar Feb. 1 contractual cost escalation from going into effect for another 30 days, according to Hickey.
The FTA allowed the extension after a plea by Sen. John Warner, R-Va., to U.S. Transportation Secretary Mary Peters over the weekend on behalf of Kaine, sources said.
Fairfax County Board of Supervisors Chairman Gerry Connolly and newly elected Republican supervisor Pat Herrity of Springfield quarreled over the project Monday night while debating a letter urging the FTA to reconsider.
Herrity said the project in its current form “represents a huge unfunded mandate” to Fairfax County residents. He proposed a bus rapid-transit system instead.
Connolly rejected that analysis, saying the bus system has been “looked at thoroughly.”
