Seems the mayor doesn’t want to talk about the light rail overrun. Greg Lacour of the Observer describes the mayor’s comments at a recent council meeting this way:
Before the City Council meeting this week, Charlotte/Douglas International Airport Director Jerry Orr gave an overview of the airport’s annual report. Orr told them skyrocketing costs of construction materials have pushed the cost estimate of a planned third runway to $224 million — nearly triple the 1998 estimate of $80 million.
A similar overrun has beset the controversial light-rail project, and opponents have roasted McCrory for his backing of the plan.
After Orr’s presentation, the mayor noted that television cameras had remained silent. “If this were another subject, I promise you there’d be huge headlines and about 30 questions from this council,” McCrory said. “I’m telling you, there’s some hypocrisy going on.”
Nice try Pat, but you don’t get off the hook that easily.
The airport is run essentially like a business. It has to cover its costs from the revenues it generates. And if its cost structure gets too high, it risky having its major client — US Airways with its big hub operation at CLT — get downsized or go away.
Now let’s compare that to transit in general and light rail in particular: transit users cover none of its capital costs and only a small portion of its operating costs. The bulk of expenses are paid for by federal, state, or local taxpayers.
Rail transit lines also have a demonstrated tendency to come in well over budget. Why? Well three Danish profs, Bent Flyvvberg, Mette Skamris Holm, and Søren Buhl, wrote a paper about that a few years ago in the Journal of the American Planning Association. They concluded it was the cost and scope of projects was intentionally understated to begin with, which is pretty much the case with what happened here in the Queen City too. And as the Danish profs said:
Legislators, administrators, bankers, media representatives, and members of the public who value honest numbers should not trust the cost estimates presented by infrastructure promoters and forecasters.
And Mr. Mayor, since your actions squarely place you in the category of promoter, how is it hypocritical to ask for some accountability?
