We have deferred posting the letter, although widely distributed, until Ms. Nicoson had a chance to return from a vacation and read it.
UPDATE: We have learned from County staff that it is "looking at funding for a second scenario for testing."
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Ms. Patti Nicoson, Chairman
Reston Master Plan Special Study Task Force
Dear Ms. Nicoson,
On behalf of RCA’s Reston 2020 Committee, I want to thank you for raising the idea of carrying out two traffic scenario analyses for Reston’s TOD areas, one more residential intensive, at the last Steering Committee meeting. We were discouraged that some members of the Steering Committee thought it was unnecessary and that County staff said they didn’t have the money to pursue a second study. Reston 2020 believes a second traffic scenario study, specifically a residential-intensive scenario, is vital to making an informed decision about future development in Reston’s TOD areas, and I would encourage you to pursue the idea to a positive decision in future Steering Committee and Task Force meetings.
The key reason that Reston 2020 believes that a second traffic analysis is essential to the Task Force effort is that decades of studies about transit-oriented development have indicated that balanced or even residential-centric TOD areas better realize the potential of these areas to:
- Maximize public transit use.
- Ease traffic congestion.
- Ease environmental impacts.
- Ease the need for road infrastructure investment.
I won’t elaborate on these conclusions in great detail because the recent RCA Reston 2020 analysis, “Reston TOD Planning: More Balance, Less Density Needed,” provides sufficient detail on both a national basis (CTOD’s typology of nearly 4,000 TOD areas) and the specific experience with Metrorail (WMATA’s 2005 survey of Metro users). Both CTOD’s national analysis and the local WMATA survey indicate that TOD areas with a relatively high residential component see much greater public transit use than TOD areas dominated by commercial development with the attendant positive impacts on traffic, environment, and infrastructure costs. The paper also provides an alternative scenario (“GMU High plus 50% residential”) for consideration by the Task Force and testing by the County staff.
Independent of Reston 2020’s analysis, Task Force member Fred Costello, an engineer highly adept at quantitative analysis, conducted his own review of the impact of the then-current County scenario and RCA Reston 2020’s proposal. That analysis, “Reston TOD Traffic & Profit Comparisons between DPZ & Reston 2020 Plans,” is posted on the Reston 2020 blog. Using a traffic index he created that measures prospective traffic against current traffic levels, he judged that the County proposal would generate 80% more traffic than currently exists while the Reston 2020 proposal—which offers about 10% less density than the County proposal, but with a strong emphasis on residential development—would generate only about 11% more traffic. That’s more than a seven-fold difference in traffic increase in Reston’s TOD areas, a difference that certainly warrants more thorough investigation in a second comparative County traffic analysis.
Not to carry out a second comparative traffic analysis of Reston’s TOD areas is, in our view, penny wise and pound foolish. If the County cannot spend the hundred thousand dollars or so to do a second traffic analysis now, it is implicitly committing itself to hundreds of millions of dollars in roadway improvements in the next two decades or absolute gridlock in Reston’s TOD areas. The former creates another unnecessary burden for Virginia and Fairfax taxpayers. The latter will serve neither the community nor developers who want businesses to lease their commercial spaces in Reston. This single-minded determination to pursue only one scenario is occurring at a time when the County Board of Supervisors is quibbling with MWAA and the US Department of Transportation about paying for construction of an $86 million Metrorail station at Rt. 28. Fairfax County and, more specifically, its taxpaying residents should not be the “cash cow” for unnecessary transportation capital expenditures, especially when the County has the opportunity to assess an alternative approach to meeting its citizens’ needs that may cost tens, if not hundreds, of millions of dollars less. For the County or the Task Force to stick its head in the sand and refuse to conduct a second traffic analysis at this important juncture would be a major disservice to Restonians, developers, and all County taxpayers.
The hundreds of millions of dollars needed to be invested in Reston’s TOD areas is exemplified in the traffic scenario test parameters laid out by the County’s Department of Transportation at the July 26, 2011, Task Force meeting. As seen on p. 7 of the DOT presentation, DOT will assume that a number of major transportation improvements have been made by 2030, including:
· Widening of Route 28 to ten lanes including an HOV lane in each direction· Widening of the Fairfax County Parkway to six lanes including an HOV lane in each direction· An overpass across the Dulles Toll Road near the County line (Rock Hill Road Overpass)· An overpass across the Dulles Toll Road west of Wiehle Avenue (Soapstone Overpass)· An underpass under the Dulles Toll Road west of Reston Parkway (Town Center Parkway/Edmund Halley Drive Underpass)· Widening of Centreville Road to six lanes per County Transportation Plan· The extension of Sunrise Valley Drive south of Frying Pan Road, completion of improvements to West Ox Road and Reston Parkway, and widening/improvement of Fox Mill Road, Monroe Street, and Frying Pan Road
And this list doesn’t include other local road improvements, creation of a “grid of streets” (possibly privately) in each TOD area, public transit improvements, TDM strategies, etc., either mentioned in the presentation or otherwise needed to make the stated improvements work.
While these projects are all listed on the latest (V. 34) Fairfax County Transportation Plan map, no completion dates are affixed to any of them and only two are funded or expected to be funded in the next few years, and some are likely to be dropped from the plan. The only funded projects according to MWCOG’s CLRP and TIPS database are the Fairfax County Parkway project (at $100 million by 2035) and the Rt. 28 widening (at $296 million by 2025), both funded by VDOT as is the case normally in Virginia. We doubt the state is enthusiastic about further major capital expenditures on Fairfax’s road network and doubt the County has the ability or will to build these projects on its own, given the authority to do so..
The uncertainty about future road infrastructure investment suggests that the current scenario is highly optimistic in assuming all this infrastructure will be in place by 2030. We think it is unrealistic to assume these facilities will all be built, especially as Virginia and the County continue to face today’s difficult economic climate. Our key concern is that the infrastructure assumptions in the scenario will end up justifying unconstrained commercial development in Reston without regard to basic TOD principles highlighting residential-commercial balance, County TOD policy, or the needs of the Reston community and County taxpayers—and then be dropped from the County’s Transportation Plan. On the other hand, an analysis of the alternative RCA Reston 2020 has offered may show that much of this road infrastructure investment is not needed to improve traffic conditions in Reston’s TOD areas. We strongly believe it would be even better to provide a projection of the costs to build road infrastructures under both scenarios to achieve a specified traffic goal (a level “C” traffic delay at key intersections, say) so that the Task Force could see the projected cost-benefit of the alternatives. Then the Task Force could make a well-informed decision about development in Reston’s TOD areas.
We know that the Tysons Task Force actually conducted three major traffic scenario evaluations to better understand traffic issues there. Here is how one participant characterized that effort:
On three occasions over a period of three years, FC DOT modeled the proposed Tysons road network comprising the grid-of-streets (GOS), the HOT lanes, two more Beltway crossings, 3-2 new interchanges on the Dulles Toll Road and widening the Toll road by 2 lanes in each direction. The model also assumed Gallows was widened to 6 lanes and Rt. 7 to 8 lanes. . . In addition, the model included 4 new over-passes inside Tysons (to eliminate signalized intersections) and the bus circulators.
Once the road network was defined, it was modeled against various land use scenarios with densities that ranged from 92 MSF to 136 MSF. Each of these modeling scenarios produced a wealth of data that characterized the performance of all roads inside and outside Tysons.
The data retrieved from the model provided, for all modes of transportation:
- Peak AM and PM trips counts- Daily trips counts- Volume/capacity (V/C) ratios- Time to travel between any two points in Tysons- Mode splits- Work trips versus non-work trips- The origins of trips terminating in Tysons- The destination of trips originating in Tysons
The goal of these modeling runs was to determine how much density Tysons could handle once
all of the planned road improvements had been made. It turns out that number is 84 MSF. . .
We believe the citizens of Reston deserve the County’s investment in at least two scenarios of less detail than those conducted for Tysons Corner, given the likely impact of future development on the community.
For the record, the latest County 20-year cost estimate for the Tysons-wide streets is $810 million and another $443 million for Tysons’ grid of streets. By comparison, what Reston 2020 has proposed to DPZ and you have suggested in the Steering Committee is a modest and vital investment in understanding how we can best make Reston’s TOD areas work for everyone. If we can save hundreds of millions of dollars in road infrastructure investment, improve the environment, mitigate traffic congestion growth, and maximize use of Metro by choosing a better development track while still allowing a more than doubling of Reston’s TOD density over two decades, we ought to do so.
Reston 2020 believes that the County owes it to Reston to conduct a second traffic analysis scenario using a high-residential scenario, such as the one Reston 2020 provided. Again, we appreciate your raising the issue at the last Steering Committee and we strongly encourage you and your colleagues on the Task Force to insist on a comparative scenario analysis by the County with a high-residential component. There is no need to rush to an ill-informed judgment on a matter as vital as the future course of development in Reston’s TOD areas.
Respectfully submitted,
Terry Maynard
On behalf of the
RCA Reston 2020 Committee
Distribution:
Reston Task Force
Fairfax County Board of Supervisors
Fairfax County Planning Commission
Fairfax County Executive
FC Department of Planning & Zoning
FC Department of Transportation
RCA Board of Directors
RA Board of Directors
ARCH Board of Directors
RCA Reston 2020 Committee
State Senator Janet Howell
State Delegate Ken Plum
Fairfax County Federation of Civic Associations Board of Directors
Local media representatives
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