Governor Kaine and a host of Virginia politicians from all parties where at Congress to announce $300 million dollars in cuts to bring the troubled Silver Line project in line with federal cost requirements.
Kaine said “The good-faith challenge was: ‘You’re close, but you’ve got to take some costs out of this project,’ ” and added “And we took them up on that challenge. Protesters at the event wanted a tunnel option to be added for the Tysons Corner segment.
Features removed from the budget include a parking garage a Wiehle Avenue, tiles on station floors, and expansions of Route 7. The parking garage at Wiehle station would be built by a public/private partnership, which probably means a private company would run it. The Route 7 widening and utility relocation would be moved out of the rail budget, and paid for by the standard road budget.
These changes bring the project well within federal cost requirements. The Federal Transit Administration will be footing $900 million of the bill, and the administration has stringent requirements for cost efficiency.
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