Charlotte Light-Rail Boondoggle

Cost overruns on a light-rail system in Charlotte, NC, have proven so great that voters have collected enough signatures to put a measure on this November’s ballot to repeal the half-cent sales tax that supports rail. To support the program, the University of North Carolina – Charlotte (UNCC) published a supposedly independent study claiming to find that light-rail was a good investment.

The study only added to the project’s embarrassment, however. First, critics claimed that some of the data in the study were obtained from biased sources, and the authors of the study admitted that the data came from a pro-light-rail web site. Based on this, the UNCC study concluded that there were no cost overruns, which the authors later agreed was wrong.

Second, rail skeptics found an incriminating set of emails between the university and the pro-rail chamber of commerce. Although the chamber commissioned the study, the emails agreed to “keep the chamber’s role hidden” so as to make the study appear more objective. The emails also revealed that the chamber effectively defined the questions asked by the study to insure that its conclusions would match the chamber’s preconceived notions. (The original link to this news article has been taken down, but the above link goes to a blog that reproduces the article.)
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Meanwhile, the company building the line is behind schedule and performed “shoddy work,” complains the local transit agency. As a result, the first line will not open until after the November election, much to the disappointment of rail advocates who hoped that a self-congratulatory celebration might sway voters.

As this 2003 story indicates, Charlotte’s light-rail line was designed by none other than Parsons Brinckerhoff Quade & Douglas (PBQD), the company that has had its hands in so many other rail projects (most of which have also had cost overruns). The story notes that PBQD and Bechtel also planned the Big Dig and its famous overrun, but it is only fair to note that Bechtel (but not PBQD) tried to warn the state of Massachusetts that its original budget for the Boston Central Artery Project was unrealistic — and was basically told to shut up.

The Antiplanner’s friend, Wendell Cox, thinks that the Charlotte cost overruns are at least as scandalous as those in Seattle. Since both cities will be voting on light rail this November, it will be interesting to see if voters agree.