Clifton, Cobb transit lines: Regional list starts to take shape

A MARTA line to Emory University, a line from the Arts Center station to Cumberland in Cobb County, and part of the Atlanta Beltline won coveted first slots on a tentative project list that may go to voters in a referendum next year.

Whether commuters will be riding those lines within 15 years as advocates hope is an open question -- depending on many factors, including at least three votes yet to come.

But as local elected officials draft a $6.1 billion list of projects to submit to voters in the 10-county Atlanta region next year, Thursday's fractious, 3-2 vote was their first to single out any specific projects, and the first indication of how the major building blocks of the list could look.

The lack of unity, in a region not used to governing together, has taken the process down to the wire.

The officials have not voted on road projects yet, and they have 10 days left. However, Norcross Mayor Bucky Johnson, who chairs the committees shaping the list, said that broad support had arisen behind a handful of major I-285 road projects, including a $500 million rebuild at the Ga. 400 interchange and one to improve ramps at Spaghetti Junction. Still, they are meeting again to do more research.

In spite of Thursday's vote, the transit projects' position on the list, and the viability of the list itself, is not certain. The five-member committee working on the first draft of the list still could change its mind. A 21-member "roundtable" of local elected officials will vote on the final list in October, and may well change it. Then comes the referendum in 2012, where voters could fund the whole list with a 10-year, 1 percent sales tax, or vote it down.

The amounts suggested for the transit projects are not enough to fully fund construction according to state estimates, and state Transportation Planning Director Todd Long said that concerned him. "If you’ve put Clifton for $700 million and you can’t deliver it for $700 million, what do you have at the end of the day?"

Local project advocates across the region have maintained that state estimates are too conservative, and that there are other sources of funding they don't take into account.

According to the law that set up the referendum, the five-member committee working on the draft must have a complete draft list of transit, road and pedestrian projects by Aug. 15. To do that, the committee members will have to agree on issues they have been unable to settle all summer.

The committee on Thursday could not come to agreement on an overall plan for dividing up money for smaller and medium projects, and rejected one that Johnson put forward.

Johnson said he thought he had vetted the plan with members and was surprised at its rejection. Asked whether the roundtable now had an overall path to a final list, he said, "No comment." However, he added, just as the committee had voted on major transit projects, it could then vote on major road projects; and then "how the two coordinate is kind of the next step; I really don’t know how that will unfold until we do it."

If Thursday's 3-2 vote of local elected officials was any guide, the referendum seems more likely than ever to be influenced by fractious politics and regional divisions.

In the vote, the mayors of Atlanta, Decatur and Kennesaw voted for a half-dozen transit projects as a "starting point." The other members of the committee, the county commission chairs of Henry and Douglas, voted against the transit projects.

The three mayors said in interviews that meant they expect those projects to be on the draft list that the five-member committee approves by Aug. 15.  They stressed that the full roundtable could change its mind, and that the dollar amounts could be tweaked, but that they intended for the amounts to fund construction.

Other major transit projects will still be included on the list, but unless things change, probably not with enough money to fund construction. A transit line to Gwinnett County could receive $100 million for preliminary planning, for example.

Henry County Commission Chairwoman B.J. Mathis agreed that spreading the money around is important, in order to get the list passed.

"This whole task of coming up with a list is a beast, to put it mildly," she said, arguing unsuccessfully for Johnson's plan to distribute the funds. "Yes, there has to be something in it for everyone. There has to be. The inner core cannot pass it without the outer counties. The outer counties can't pass it without the inner core."

Though she voted against the transit projects, the referendum's backers said that did not necessarily imperil the list.

"You’re looking at Cobb, Gwinnett, Fulton and DeKalb represent 75 percent of the registered voters, just those four," said Paul Bennecke, who is one of the privately funded strategists for the referendum campaign.  "I think if this executive roundtable and then roundtable deliver a project list that creates jobs, retains jobs, increases quality of life and reduces traffic, that’s something that’s going to sell it in all 10 counties."

Taking shape

The total available amount for projects of regional significance including roads, mass transit, bicycle and pedestrian is expected to be $6.14 billion. These projects were tentatively approved Thursday, and could still change. The dollar amounts would not fund the full projects, but could be joined by other sources of money, such as fares, federal funds or local taxes such as those from the Beltline's tax district.

• Clifton Corridor MARTA route, $700 million

• Atlanta Beltline, likely streetcars, $600 million

• Atlanta to Cumberland northwest corridor, possibly light rail, $825 million

• MARTA state of good repair funding (various upgrades), $500 million

• Restore Clayton County local bus service, $100 million

• I-85 northeast corridor, $100 million for preliminary study and planning of a possible light-rail line into Gwinnett