Not in Time for the Election

Honolulu is voting today on whether to spend $4 to $5 billion on an elevated rail system. The city is hoping the federal government to match local funds, but the mayor is so eager to have the rail line that he wants to start construction before the feds give their approval.

After a campaign in which the mayor used his own campaign funds to pay for newspaper ads slurring rail skeptics, opponents managed to collect enough signatures to put the rail project on the ballot. As it happens, the city published a draft environmental impact statement (DEIS), needed for federal approval, just a few days before the election. (The DEIS is dated October 28, but it wasn’t posted on line until November 1st or 2nd.)

Naturally, the DEIS is full of enthusiastic statements about how the rail line is the best way to reduce congestion, air pollution, and other problems. But the only alternatives considered are building nothing and building rail, and doing something has to look better than doing nothing. Considering the cost and the relatively tiny benefits, however, doing nothing should be the preferred alternative.

Start with transportation. Table 3-13 says that building the rail line will reduce the automobile’s mode share of trips by residents from 82 to 80 percent. But it will increase transit’s share only from 6 to 7 percent, so there are some rounding problems here. It turns out that the rail reduces the actual number of auto trips by, at most, 1.5 percent.

Rail is also predicted to reduce vehicle-miles traveled by, at most, 3.7 percent (table 3-14). That’s rather unbelievable since we are talking about only one rail line, not a network of rails. Since auto trips tend to be longer than transit trips, a 1.5 percent reduction in auto trips should result in less than a 1.5 percent reduction in VMT, not 2.5 times the reduction.

Average auto speeds today (calculated by dividing vehicle miles traveled by vehicle hours traveled) are 34.7 mph. By 2030, this will fall to 32.7 mph under no build, but only 34.0 with rail.

“Under congested conditions, even small reductions in traffic volumes can show large reductions in delay,” page 3-24 says hopefully. While the DEIS talks a lot about evaluating the effects of rail on congestion, it doesn’t actually reveal the results of that evaluation.

Most of page 3-3 is used to describe “levels of service,” the standard measure of congestion used by traffic engineers: A is excellent, F is fail. Table 3-7 indicates that the existing peak-hour levels of service on the island range from C to F.

Future levels of service, with and without rail, are — oops! They must have left that page out. The DEIS does give peak-hour traffic volumes in vehicles per hour. Comparing tables 3-7 with 3-20 reveals that, even with rail, volumes on selected roads will increase by 3 to 49 percent above current volumes.

Of course, the DEIS also predict that rail will reduce traffic below the future no-build alternative by 1 to 12 percent, but then you have to ask: how much would it cost to provide an equal amount of traffic relief with signal coordination or other roadway improvements.
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The Antiplanner wonders if they didn’t publish the future levels of service with and without rail because they didn’t want to admit that rail would not make any difference. Actually, table 3-22 reveals that, near park-and-ride lots, rail won’t help and in some cases will reduce the level of service from D to F.

Nevertheless, the DEIS claims that the rail line will produce huge mobility benefits. It turns out most of those benefits are to people who are riding transit. For example, table 7-2 estimates that taking the bus from Wai’anae to University of Hawaii, Mānoa, will take 121 minutes, while the rail line will reduce this to 91 to 93 minutes. Google says these two points are 34 miles apart or “about 48 minutes” by car. Similarly, the table says that Kapolei to Ala Moana Center would be 105 minutes by bus, but only 57 to 59 minutes by rail. Google says these two points are only 35 minutes apart by car. So rail won’t be very attractive to drivers.

Chapter 4 describes environmental effects. Table 4-12 predicts that rail will reduce annual air pollution outputs, compared with no build, by 3.2 to 4.0 percent. However, planners didn’t bother to take into account the amount of air pollution that would be generated to run the trains. Hawaii gets more than 90 percent of its electricity from burning fossil fuels.

“If the electricity used to operate any one of the Build Alternatives is generated by combustion,” the DEIS notes on pages 4-95 to 4-96, “this may produce additional emissions.” Such additional emissions are easily calculated, but the people who wrote the DEIS didn’t do it, possibly they don’t want to admit that the rail line (like the ones in Baltimore, Cleveland, Dallas, Denver, Miami, and several other cities) will pollute more than the cars it takes off the road.

Planners also failed to account for air pollution during construction (p. 4-157 of the DEIS claims it would be limited to dust — perhaps planners think Diesel equipment used to build rail lines doesn’t pollute). Nor do they mention greenhouse gases or the fact that the concrete piers used to support the elevated rail line will generate huge amounts of CO2.

The DEIS does admit that the rail line would impose huge economic stresses on Honolulu. The construction cost, of course, will be in the billions. But even after construction is paid for, the rail line will be costly.

Transit operations currently use about 11 percent of the city’s budget. The rail line would increase this to 14 percent (page 6-7). Will the city be able to keep it up? Or will it be forced to cut bus service? One of the ironies is that the Honolulu urban area currently has the second-highest rate of transit ridership (annual trips per capita) in the U.S.: only the New York urban area is higher. Considering the history of new rail lines in Los Angeles, San Jose, and many other cities, there is a very real danger that the rail line will actually reduce transit ridership in Honolulu.

Nice view of the mountains. Too bad the rail line is in the way. (Click for a larger view.)

Finally, even rail advocates have to admit that an overhead rail line in a near-paradise like Honolulu is going to be just plain ugly. If you don’t believe it, take a look at the before-and-after photos/simulations on pages 9 through 28 of the second part of chapter 4 — and then imagine a decade or two of wear and grime. Maybe Chicago doesn’t mind an elevated going through its skyscraper canyons, but future Hawaiians will be eager to tear this thing down.

The rail line will pose an enormous financial burden on Hawaii. It will take few cars off the road and do little about congestion. Other alternatives that planners refused to consider in the DEIS should be able to do far more at a far lower cost. The DEIS is deceptive when it claims the rail line will reduce air pollution when it doesn’t calculate the pollution produced to power the rail line. And the rail line will be a blight on the Oahu landscape. Let’s hope Honolulu residents are smart enough to vote it down today.