And a recent column from Brent Larkin at the Cleveland Plain Dealer helped us realize just how close we came to making a huge mistake.
...in a vain attempt to sell this project to the public, state officials changed their story so often it made the head swim. Truth is, one needn't be Nostradamus to project cost overruns totaling hundreds of millions of dollars -- with the money to cover those overruns coming directly from the pockets of Ohio taxpayers.What a mess.
When the Obama administration offered Ohio $400 million for the rail project, Strickland administration officials essentially said, "Sure, that should cover it." But just months earlier, as part of the state's application to the feds, the administration placed the startup cost at $563.7 million.
It gets worse.
A Government Accounting Office study of transportation projects, requested by Congress, concluded in March 2009 that passenger rail projects "had the highest cost escalation out of all the transportation modes studied -- averaging 45 percent higher than estimated."
ODOT's ridership predictions called for an annual taxpayer subsidy of $17 million over 20 years. But that same GAO report cited a study of 27 rail projects that found ridership forecasts for 90 percent of the projects were overestimated, with 67 percent overestimated by more than two-thirds.
Members of the train cult will keep making up projections about jobs lost. Of course, these were the same people that said Ted Strickland's internal poll numbers had him up six points.
The fact is, it's easy to make numbers up.
But with an $8 billion deficit reality staring us in the face, we can't afford to play games with the exact kind of project that has been historically proven to be a net negative.
To solve the budget crisis Ted Strickland leaves behind, we need to go with what works - reducing government, not increasing its obligations.
Here is the membership of the so-called "train cult":
ReplyDeleteThe Butler County Commissioners (all Republican, the Columbus Chamber of Commerce, the Cleveland Chamber of Commerce, the Greater Cincinnati USA Regional Chamber of Commerce, Porter Wright, AT&T, AEP, Columbia Gas, University of Cincinnati, The Ohio State University, and countless others.
The GAO report Larkin mentions talked about studies that showed GLOBAL estimates on costs and ridership, it didn't talk about the error rate for such estimates done in the United States. The GAO report also observed that in the past two years, U.S. domestic passenger rail ridership has grown 20%.
Once the federal award was announced, the State modified the 3C plan to make it affordable under the federal grant. Larkin leaves out that key fact.
You, of course, leave out the key fact that the 3C plan would require $0 state expenditures during Kasich's term. Zero. Nada.
The so-called $17 million "subsidy" wasn't required until 2017 at the earliest. And even at that, it'd still be more cost efficient means of using infrastructure to create jobs than anything the Kasich Administration has shared so far.
The fact is that your seizing on a columnist by a guy who can't even conceptualize that infrastructure construction can have secondary affects in the economy to stimulate private job creation.
The Chambers of Commerce got that. You and clueless Brent Larkin don't.
John Kasich killed $400 million in economic development.
BTW, not the GAO or Larkin ever made the case that these projects historically have been a net negative.
ReplyDeleteYou're just making that one up entirely.
Well GQ, since GAO and these other guys haven't, please name a rail project that has not been a net negative historically? (And what is train's share of the transit market in NYC and Chicago?) No, Tokyo and Osaka don't count. These profitable rail systems are run largely by private companies. Yes, Virginia, many rail lines there don't rely on hefty government subsidies. They don't need to: Japanese don't own cars, tolls are hefty, they live and work, well very, very close together, and the train and bus infrastructure is impressive, especially compared to the roads. New York, Boston...okay maybe. Oahu, seems to make sense. As for Ohio? Yeah, COTA to 3C to the Rapid is just, well, not tempting (sounds painful actually). Thanks, but let's give bigger tax breaks on hybrids and plug-ins and how about finihsing that third lane on 71...
ReplyDeleteThis must be wrong. All government projects come in on-time and on-budget.
ReplyDeleteModern only continues to prove our point.
ReplyDeleteHe refuses to answer the fact that NO ONE WILL PAY TO RIDE A TRAIN THAT IS SLOWER THAN DRIVING.
He'd rather keep screaming about how $400 million would make such a HUGE economic impact on Ohio.
Once the federal award was announced, the State modified the 3C plan to make it affordable under the federal grant. Larkin leaves out that key fact.
In other words, they fudged it.
You, of course, leave out the key fact that the 3C plan would require $0 state expenditures during Kasich's term. Zero. Nada.
So what? It still projects that the taxpayers will have to subsidize the system. Maybe John Kasich cares about Ohio's budget beyond his own term, unlike Ted Strickland, who just kicked the can down the road.
The fact is that your seizing on a columnist by a guy who can't even conceptualize that infrastructure construction can have secondary affects in the economy to stimulate private job creation.
Okay Modern, lets look at a recent example... didn't Ohio receive BILLIONS in federal money from the Stimulus, with the promise that unemployment would remain below 8%?
How'd all that "economic development" and infrastructure spending work out? Isn't our unemployment rate still close to 10%?
Bytor-
ReplyDeleteYou lack the capacity of reading that I'm amazed you graduated high school.
1) The point is that the plan was revised to meet available funds. Larkin's column criticizes the plan on the point without acknowledging that the plan was ALREADY adjusted for the realities of the available funding.
2) The "subsidy" is less than the subsidy that highways get, airports, and commercial sea ports. Heck, it was as much as Ohio spends MOWING the medians in highways... (yet would create more jobs)
3) You're changing the topic. The issue is that you're seizing on a guy as prove of valid criticism when Larkin cannot even contemplate the concept of secondary effects on economic development.
And rather than address the point that Larkin is wrong and Strickland is right about the secondary effects on economic development, you want to trot out a partisan talking point about the stimulus.
A stimulus that even John Kasich admits he would have accepted had he been Governor.
Again, Bytor, if passenger rail is such a horrible mode of transportation, then why did the same GAO study find that U.S. passenger rail ridership had increased 20% in the past two years?
ReplyDeletePersonal insults. Brilliant, Hester.
ReplyDeleteCompared to driving, it is a horrible choice that very very few are going to make. Its more expensive, its slower, and you have to rent a car or make other transportation arrangements at your destination. How hard is that to understand? If ridership is really up by 20%, its probably due to increased costs and hassles of air travel. That doesn't apply to 3c. And that doesn't change the fact the ridership is probably overestimated, as it almost always is with these projects per the GAO.
Its a ridiculous project that wastes tax dollars, federal and state, while we are facing huge deficits. I wish the $400 million weren't being spent at all. The stimulus was about how infrastructure spending would save the economy, which is the same argument you are making for 3c. That's not changing the subject.