The money paid by drivers on the Dulles Toll Road may be used to pay for construction projects that have nothing to do with improving the toll road or building an adjacent Metrorail project, angering Fairfax residents already frustrated with the management of the Metro project. The Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority’s 2011 budget includes billions for construction of the Dulles rail line, but it also includes millions of dollars for improvements to the nearby Fairfax County Parkway, among other projects.
The one project that attracted the attention of the region’s Coalition for Smarter Growth, however, is the one that will be built in Loudoun County using toll money collected in Fairfax.
The airports authority’s budget includes more than $24 million for planning and widening of Route 606, which runs through Loudoun County to the west of the airport, connecting the Dulles Toll Road on the north and east and with Route 50 on the south.
“Most of the public would assume that the Dulles Corridor is the road and rail project itself, but not the back of Dulles all the way down to Route 50,” said Stewart Schwartz, the coalition’s executive director.
The scrutiny of the airports authority’s spending comes in the wake of its decision to build an underground Metro station at Dulles airport, instead of an aboveground option favored by local officials that would have saved Northern Virginia taxpayers about $330 million.
Schwartz’s organization sent a letter to Fairfax County Board Chairwoman Sharon Bulova about the Route 606 project, calling on her to renew her opposition to the use of toll revenues for the project.
Bulova is no stranger to the issue, having fought in late 2009 for the toll revenue to be used exclusively along the toll road, and not Route 606.
Then, as now, the airports authority asserted that Route 606 is a part of the Dulles Corridor and that widening Route 606 would benefit the toll road, decreasing traffic congestion.
“This was all a part of the program originally conceived and approved by everybody,” said airports authority Chairman Charles Snelling.
