Category: Transportation
-
P3 Mirage
by Randy Salzman With recent reporting about Norfolk’s ERC (Elizabeth River Crossings) public private partnership (P3) on top of extensive coverage of the 460 Toll Road debacle, Virginians should begin questioning “privatization” of public infrastructure. The data is clear. The privatization of highways has not been “capitalists’ gifts to taxpayers,” as press releases have implied.…
-
Virginia’s Commitment to Smart Cars and Smart Roads
by James A. Bacon Tom Dingus has done as much as anyone to advance vehicle automation and the advent of self-driving cars. Many of the automated features found in automobiles today — automated braking, active cruise control, rear-view cameras — were tested at the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute, where he serves as director. But Dingus is…
-
McAuliffe Adminstration Gives P3s a Second Chance
by James A. Bacon The McAuliffe administration has spent much of its first two years unwinding the legacy of botched and controversial public private partnerships inked by the McDonnell administration: radically truncating the plan to to build a U.S. connector between Petersburg and Suffolk, and revising significantly the tolling for Norfolk’s Midtown-Downtown tunnel project. Now, after the enactment of…
-
Woolly Headed Thinking about Transportation
by James A. Bacon Virginia Beach’s ongoing debate over light rail is emblematic of everything that is wrong with Virginia’s system for determining which transportation projects get built. While the Virginia Department of Transportation is implementing a mechanism for ranking road and highway projects, there is no mechanism for ascertaining the proper balance between roads/highways and…
-
Building an “Unmanned” Industry Cluster
by James A. Bacon Two decades ago the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute (VTTI) had two sponsors, fifteen employees and a dream of becoming a major player in testing new automotive technologies. Sixteen years ago, it opened a literal road to nowhere — a 2.2-mile “smart road” cutting through the hills of Montgomery County that ended in…
-
Breaking the Cycle of Debt and Suspended Licenses
by James A. Bacon Joe Herbin has always been a hard worker. When he was 15 years old, he’d accumulated the $1,200 it took to buy an old Cadillac. The fact that he didn’t have a driver’s license — or was too young even to get one — wasn’t a deterrent. He installed a bad-ass sound…
-
The Slow, Inevitable Demise of Traditional Mass Transit?
by James A. Bacon The 2010s were supposed to be the era of mass transit in the Washington metropolitan region. Millenials were jettisoning their automobiles in favor of walking, biking, buses and rail. Localities were zoning for denser development around transit stops and Metro stations. State and federal governments were channeling more money into new rail projects.…
-
Virginia's Maritime Future Is Now
by James A. Bacon Virginia’s maritime industry has long anticipated the arrival of the new giant, post-Panamax ships, and now they’re here — a couple of years before they were anticipated, and well before the completion of the Panama Canal expansion that is expected to release the floodgates. As the East Coast port with the deepest…
-
Virginia’s Maritime Future Is Now
by James A. Bacon Virginia’s maritime industry has long anticipated the arrival of the new giant, post-Panamax ships, and now they’re here — a couple of years before they were anticipated, and well before the completion of the Panama Canal expansion that is expected to release the floodgates. As the East Coast port with the deepest…
-
Tough on Bad Drivers
The latest from WalletHub… Virginia is the third strictest state in the country when dealing with high-risk drivers. The Old Dominion is consistently among the tougher states for Driving Under the Influence penalties and prevention, speeding enforcement and reckless driving enforcement. For what it’s worth: Red states are slightly tougher on at-risk drivers than blue…
-
More Sequestration Pain for Virginia
by James A. Bacon The pain of federal budget sequestration cuts in Virginia is not yet over. Look what The Washington Post reports today: According to the Defense Department research, things are likely to worsen over the next four years. From 2010 to 2012, Virginia experienced $9.8 billion in defense cuts, with the vast majority…
-
Virginia's Spaceport: a Century-Long Commitment
by James A. Bacon The McAuliffe administration has settled a dispute with Orbital Science Corp. over insurance of the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport (MARS) at Wallops Island. Orbital, which is in the business of launching payload into orbit, will reimburse the state for one-third of the $15 million in damages incurred by the spaceport when Orbital’s rocket exploded during lift-off…
-
Virginia’s Spaceport: a Century-Long Commitment
by James A. Bacon The McAuliffe administration has settled a dispute with Orbital Science Corp. over insurance of the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport (MARS) at Wallops Island. Orbital, which is in the business of launching payload into orbit, will reimburse the state for one-third of the $15 million in damages incurred by the spaceport when Orbital’s rocket exploded during lift-off…
-
Does Uber Save Lives?
Speaking of safer roads… Consider the impact of Uber on peoples’ driving habits. Richmond Biz Sense reports that more than 1,200 vehicles in the City of Richmond, Chesterfield County and Henrico County have signed up with the Virginia Department of Motor Vehicles to pick up passengers for hire under the Uber banner. That’s more than double…
-
Stricter Penalties, Safer Roads
by James A. Bacon I will concede this upfront: Bacon playing with statistics is like a toddler playing with a gun. Nothing good can come of it. With that word of warning, I ask readers to indulge me for a moment. WalletHub, the financial advisory website, has come up with yet another listicle — a…