According to the Hampton Roads blog (click here), support for the light rail system in Virginia Beach is eroding:

“Cost overruns and delays to build Norfolk’s light-rail system are threatening this city’s proposed project, giving ammunition to skeptics, putting proponents on the defensive and eroding support from those in the middle.”

“If there was a vote today, it wouldn’t pass,” Virginia Beach Vice Mayor Louis Jones said. He said the council’s support for light rail is “softening.”

“Norfolk’s troubles come at a critical time in the Beach’s light-rail aspirations. The city is working to close a $40 million deal for a railroad right of way identified for light rail, though state and federal money has yet to come through. Beach leaders have bought land for a train station at Town Center. And much of the city’s future growth planning revolves around extending Norfolk’s line from Newtown Road to the Oceanfront.

A light-rail feasibility study is under way. The City Council has not voted on the project.”

…”Moss said that given Norfolk’s experience, it will be hard to trust cost estimates that will come from the HRT study that is under way.

The projected price of the Norfolk line has soared from $232 million to about $340 million, a 47 percent increase that angry officials said they weren’t told about.

“Whenever they give you a number, what faith will you have in that number?” Moss said. “Very little, I think.”

Riders of Washington, DC’s Metrobus system are much more likely to be low-income minorities than users of the Metrorail system, according to a 2007 survey. The median income for Metrorail riders is $102,100, while the median income for bus riders is only two-thirds as much at $69,600; more than half of bus riders are minorities [...]

Add Austin’s Capital Metro to the list of transit agencies that have gotten themselves into serious financial trouble because they insisted on building an expensive rail transit line. After blowing $300 million on a commuter-rail line and other questionable improvements, Capital Metro is heavily in debt and lacks the resources to fund bus and other [...]

How Much Lying Do You Allow For? Sound Politics, WA Both the Times and PI reporting (before they turned into a website) is/was characterized widely by rail proponents as blatantly against light rail and Sound Transit. 2. Can the mayor legally bind property owners to foot the bill for "cost over runs" ...

That's what John Niles, a transportation consultant, tells me in the e-mail below. Niles declares that he is a volunteer advisor to the campaign that is opposing Proposition 1, the $17.9 billion ballot measure for Sound Transit. I offer up Niles' observations and a couple of attachments for your perusal because I don't have time to go investigate how much Portland, Denver and all those other cities spend on their light rail vs. buses. Here are a couple pdf's that Niles sent. One is a spreadsheet, the other is the Washington Policy Center's take ...

On Crosscut, David Brewster questioned whether Sound Transit's first phase, which won voter approval in 1996, is one of the "word's biggest boondoggles?" He compares the agency's initial promises to voters with the fact they are now billions of dollars over budget and many years late. While Sound Transit's troubles are well documented, the philosophy that led to the agency's woes is even more outrageous. Brewster says:

Are you shocked? If so, consider that most of these projects are in fact wildly popular, even if the public had to be gulled to go along with building them. It's ...

Rail transit construction is so farking expensive that the people overseeing lose all sense of proportion. Take Denver’s FasTracks program, which is supposed to build about 119 miles of rail transit over eight years for $6.2 billion. That’s more than $2 million a day, seven days a week, 52 weeks a year. So its not surprising [...]

Since lifting a construction moratorium in March, Port of Seattle commissioners have approved spending on six projects.

Todd Pacific Shipyards of Seattle's proposed bid price of $25,985,125 to construct a 50-car ferry for Washington State Ferries was much higher than the $16.8 million estimated by state engineers.

Mowat Construction will build a station at Sea-Tac Airport for Sound Transit's light rail system, but for $72 million, $20 million more than the agency initially thought.