Agenda - 04-27-2017 - 1 - Consideration of the Final Draft Durham – Orange Light Rail Cost Sharing Agreement and Final Draft Orange County Transit Plan

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153 project scope has further developed and grown since the 2012 BRIP, with plans to have a bus rapid transit corridor extend beyond UNC to the Southern Village Park and Ride, and is now known as the North-South Bus Rapid Transit project.3 Most importantly, the Plan continues to prioritize the essential transit investment that is the Durham-Orange Light Rail Transit Project. The Plan has carefully incorporated a variety of transit options and solutions and has demonstrated that funding is available for all of these different components of the Plan. We appreciate that the Plan contains a variety of transportation solutions to achieve discrete objectives, all supporting the overarching goal of establishing a comprehensive transit system to serve residents and businesses throughout Orange County. II. The Critical Role of the Durham-Orange Light Rail Transit Project's The Durham-Orange Light Rail Transit project serves as a keystone piece of the Plan and our future transportation network. While the funding scheme for the project has shifted with waning state support and a different federal funding structure, the project's importance to our region has held steady. Investing in this project now, under the current environmental documents and in the current federal funding process, is critical. Waiting or postponing is tantamount to choosing not to do the project at all. The recent independent financial analysis conducted by Davenport and Company demonstrated a feasible financial path forward for the light rail project. The project costs include a 30% contingency—more than the minimum amount recommended by the Federal Transit Authority—creating a funding "cushion" for possible cost overruns.4 Additionally, GoTriangle has identified a set of risk mitigation strategies to further insulate against the unlikely event of a cost overrun or need for additional funding.5 Even if such an occasion were to arise, Orange County would have the opportunity to reassess the project and its support for the project at that juncture. Importantly, the debt incurred by this project will be GoTriangle's, not Orange or Durham County's. Given these funding assurances, SELC is satisfied that the light rail project continues to make financial sense—and that the D-O LRT project is in fact a sound and necessary investment. The light rail will create economic opportunities for the County, while fostering desirable compact, walkable communities and preventing environmentally-damaging growth patterns. In addition to providing a reliable transportation alternative to personal vehicles, rail transit encourages smart land-use decisions such as mixed-use, dense development. Permanent, fixed-guideway transit options—like the D-O LRT project—help land-use planners, businesses, and residents establish long-term plans about how to guide growth and development in their communities. In turn, compact communities use less land compared with their sprawling counterparts; as a result, fewer natural areas are paved over, farms, wetlands, and forests are preserved, and water quality standards are maintained. These dense, mixed-use communities are in high demand by individuals and businesses alike, offering many economic development 3 Id. 4 See Draft Orange County Transit Plan Appendix B: Transit Plan Risk&Mitigation Strategies(Mar.3,2017),at 5. s See generally id. 2