Transportation officials may be pivoting as costs explode on interstate bridge replacement

For more than a decade, the Columbia River Crossing Project, consisting of replacing the I-5 Bridge linking Portland, OR, and Vancouver, WA, and building light rail, has been mired in intense debate. Most of the controversy, besides the astronomically high $14 to $15 billion estimated cost, has been the inclusion of light rail. Our past work focused on the plummeting rail and transit ridership in Portland and Vancouver, questioning the need for rail on the project at all.

The cost of light rail is also in dispute. In 2009, it was estimated that light rail would cost $1 billion on a $4 billion project, or 25%. However, now the public is being told rail comprises $2 billion of the $14 billion project, or 14%. With Sound Transit’s massive $35 billion overrun on rail, and a California High Speed Rail line that’s currently underwater, it’s questionable how rail cost projections increased at a lower rate than the bridge.

In short, it’s likely that rail costs are being severely underestimated and will comprise a much larger share of the total budget than projected.

The inclusion of rail seems to be about bolstering floundering transit agencies struggling for relevancy and money – not moving more people. TriMet’s financial woes are well documented, with an unsustainable spending model, to which the agency readily admits. The push for rail comes at a time when rail projects across the country are seeing massive cost overruns, poor utilization, and unsustainable budgets.

Yet it appears officials at the Interstate Bridge Replacement Program, an amalgamation of public and private entities, are looking to move forward with Phase 1, a $5.9 billion freeway replacement, with auxiliary lanes and shoulders and connections to other key highways and arterials. They estimate the project could be open to traffic by 2035, with full Phase 1 completion by 2039. Phase 1 doesn’t include building light rail but instead includes the capacity for its future inclusion.

The Phase 1 completion cost is less than half of the proposed $14.4 billion officials say they need from tax and toll payers to complete the full project, which of course, includes light rail.

Last April, the bridge conglomerate released the Final Environmental Impact Statement, a 944-page document outlining project impacts, including what amounts to a significant reduction in traffic congestion versus the current configuration.

Based on the recommended design option, traffic congestion plummets from about 30 hours per day on the current span to 13.75 hours, a 54% decrease. However, traffic throughput falls from 196,600 people in cars to 191,200, a 3% drop. Despite the proposed bridge including an auxiliary lane in each direction, demand for the bridge falls due to variable tolls that change by time of day.

Building a new, bigger bridge span to reduce the capacity of the bridge through tolling seems counter-productive. Transportation capacity exists to move the most people through a corridor, in the quickest, safest manner. But in this case, however, fewer drivers would use the new bridge than the old one, despite drivers paying more. Fewer trucks would also use the new bridge, reducing freight mobility.

Yet despite being a highway project meant to move vehicles and goods across the Columbia River, most of the new upgrades paid by drivers would be for bus and rail transit, walking and biking, with new wide bike paths, wide shoulders for buses, and space and engineering geared for light rail.

While many travelers want to see a successful replacement for the old Interstate Bridge, the replacement should instead focus on moving more vehicles and commerce between states, as drivers are paying the full cost, with transit and other modes indirectly benefiting.