Elected officials who sit on the policy board for the Capital Area Metropolitan Planning Organization are scrutinizing development of a proposed commuter rail line between San Antonio and Georgetown now that a vital player has dropped out of the project.

Lone Star Rail District had been seeking to put the $2.4 billion commuter rail on the existing Union Pacific Corp. freight rail line. Regional UP freight would have been transferred to a new line to be built east of I-35.

In February, UP terminated an agreement with the LSRD that would have been a stepping stone to eventually allowing a commuter rail project to use the freight company’s existing lines.

“Over the course of the past six-plus years of meetings, discussions and studies, it has become apparent that the desired track alignments and infrastructure requirements necessary to support the efficient and reliable coming of freight and commuter passenger rail are unattainable,” wrote Jerry Wilmoth, UP’s general manager of network infrastructure.

At Georgetown City Council’s March 9 meeting, Council Member Ty Gipson, who serves on the LSRD board, said the city’s membership in the rail district could be reconsidered during budget discussions this summer.

“The city of Georgetown’s membership in the Lone Star Rail District runs through the end of the fiscal year [on Sept. 30],” he said. “We will continue to stay engaged with Lone Star representatives and anticipate providing the City Council another update in advance of this summer’s budget discussions in order to determine the next steps for the city’s participation in the Lone Star Rail District.”

CAMPO’s decisions

On March 21, CAMPO board members peppered LSRD and Texas Department of Transportation officials with questions about how to move forward on the project. The CAMPO board approved reassessing the project and looking at other viable alternatives to bring back for discussion at its June 6 meeting.

Board members also expressed concern about how LSRD has spent $26 million in state and federal funds.

“I’m concerned that we’re looking at a boondoggle,” said Cynthia Long, a CAMPO board member and Williamson County commissioner. “We have spent a lot of public money on a lot of public studies and have nothing to show for it.”

LSRD Director Joe Black said most of the money allocated from CAMPO has been spent on consultants because LSRD only has two full-time employees.

Several board members, including Mayor Dale Ross, who is Georgetown’s representative on the board, wanted to freeze spending until the June 6 meeting.

“I voted to suspend the spending of money until we knew the direction the LSRD is going in,” Ross said. “Until [LSRD] gets direction from CAMPO, what would you spend money on? … I don’t think it ought to be spent until we have a clear path forward.”

However, Black said to reassess the project as indicated by the board’s March 21 vote would require using the consultants. The motion to freeze spending failed with 9-10 vote.

Moving forward                            

Black insists UP’s termination of the agreement has not fundamentally changed the project despite generating some bad press. The district, which is currently in the middle of an environmental study that could be complete in mid-2018, is continuing work on the project as if nothing happened, he said.

“Public perception-wise [UP’s announcement] was a big hit because people immediately assumed we were dead, and the project is never going to happen,” Black said. “We’re confident we’re going to be able to find a solution.”

Black said the district has “at least three or four alternatives” for the project that do not involve the UP line. Those alternatives, as well as the original plan to use the UP line, will continue to be studied by staff and will be presented to the public at a series of open houses in late spring or early summer. If using UP’s line is deemed the most efficient path forward, the district will look to reopen negotiations with the freight carrier, he said.

UP Media Director Jeff DeGraff said UP will focus on projects aimed at expanding capacity on its current line now that it has terminated its agreement with LSRD. Freight traffic within the Austin-San Antonio corridor has increased 60 percent during the past 10 years, and combining freight and passenger rail traffic was of concern to the company, he said.

“[UP had] some specific concerns we informed Lone Star Rail about early in this process,” DeGraff said. “Ten years later, we’ve looked at their plans and proposals, and we haven’t seen any progress as far as addressing our concerns.”

[polldaddy poll=9385756]Bill Bingham, an attorney representing the district, said he thought the concern regarding freight and passenger rail traffic had been sufficiently addressed through the discussions so far.

Bingham said the plan to address UP’s capacity concerns included relocating the rail east of I-35 so regional freight could pass through cities without affecting commuter traffic. Local freight, to be delivered from one city to another within the region, would remain on the line west of I-35.

“We have developed a plan that provides them additional capacity to operate their freight operation,” he said. “We really thought we had resolved that question, so we need to discuss that with them to understand how that concern arises.”

LSRD started the environmental study process in October 2014 and began analyzing seven route alignments, including the UP line, in early 2016. Black said that because UP has a history of changing its mind on projects, LSRD should keep any UP options in the analysis.

“If UP doesn’t come back then they drop out of the process, and they’re not reasonable alternatives anymore,” he said.

Ross said City Council members could use the information from CAMPO’s June 6 meeting to determine how to address the city’s membership in the district.

“Based on that information, the council will decide if they want to stay in or not,” he said.

Additional reporting by Beth Wade