Pages

 

NYSDOT Stonewalls

0 comments
The chronicles of the Willets Point ramps continue, with the state transportation agency apparently operating in bad faith-and against the interest of independent and transparent review. As we have commented previously, NYSDOT has replied negatively to the letter from the Natural Resources Defense Council requesting that the agency conduct an independent review of the data pertaining to the feasibility of the aforementioned ramps.

The genesis of the request devolved from NRDC's concern that the lead agency, in this case EDC, simply couldn't be trusted to provide accurate and reliable traffic information-a supposition that itself devolved from EDC's two separate and contradictory traffic reports pertaining to Willets Point traffic generation. As we have said before: "But the blatant contradictions in the two discrepant Willets Point traffic studies had caught the attention of the Natural Resources Defense Council-arguably New York's leading environmental group. In March, NRDC wrote to both NYSDOT and the FHWA calling for an independent review of the traffic going from Willets Point to the Van Wyck: "NRDC is not taking a position on advancing the Willets Point project or on constructing the ramps. But based on our preliminary review, we are concerned over the discrepancies in the study results, and also by the prospect that a project could impair regional mobility..."

NYSDOT's indefensible response came a few months later: "That was last March-fast forward to July, and NYSDOT has finally responded to the NRDC request in a letter dated July, 2, 2010-but is claiming that there is no need for an independent review: "The NEPA documents that are being developed are an Environmental Assessment and a revised Access Modification Report....We understand the request for an independent review but believe that working closely with NYCEDC, we can assure that the data will be based on sound data."

But, at the same time that NYSDOT is doing the macarena with EDC, it is stonewalling Willets Point United's effort to get access to the data being submitted-as well as the cozy conversations between the state and EDC. As WPU's Jerry Antonacci writes in his FOIA letter to the state agency: "You indicated during our telephone conversation that a revised version of the AMR is expected to be submitted by NYCEDC to NYSDOT on or about October 1, 2010. However, the present process of revising the AMR necessarily generates revised draft AMR content and materials which are all records that are responsive to the above-referenced FOIL Request, and which NYSDOT is either obligated to disclose, or entitled to exercise its discretion to disclose, consistent with the promises of an open, transparent and cooperative process that were made by NYSDOT at the two meetings held during February and March, 2010. Finally, we point out that NYSDOT and NYCEDC each fully disclosed the entire August, 2009 Draft AMR, with no redaction whatsoever, in response to previous Records Access Requests made months ago." (emphasis added)
 
So, let's get this straight. The revision of this original-and fraudulent-AMR only came about because of the intervention of WPU and its traffic consultant Brian Ketcham, who flagged the contradictions in the two studies done by EDC and forced NYSDOT's hand in all this. At the time, as we highlight above, all concerned promised that Ketcham would be included in the discussion and WPU would be privy to the ongoing data collection and analysis. However, instead of following through on its promise of cooperation  and transparency, NYSDOT has gone the opposite route-stonewalling the data requests and shutting the only righteous analyst out of the revision process.
 
NYSDOT has, in effect, embraced the fraudsters saying that (we), "believe that working closely with NYCEDC, we can assure that the data will be based on sound data."  Can there be any clearer demonstration of the agency's collusion than this breathtaking assertion made to the state's lead environmental group?

So, the two agencies have decided to partner together without the benefit of any independent review-and without, at least as far as we know, any planned public review process. WPU has gathered the support of a dozen local community groups and civics that have all requested NYSDOT to provide an independent review. All these groups believe, as Council member Dan Halloran expressed at last week's council land use hearing, that they don't believe a word that EDC says.

NYSDOT is walking on thin ice here-and the agency better be prepared to answer the questions that will be peppered at it by legislators at the upcoming state senate hearing on the ramps. Like Lucy, NYSDOT has a lot of "splaining to do." The open question that remains is, will the FHWA buy into this tainted review process?

0 comments:

Post a Comment

  • Greenspan's Cult of Personality... Review topics and articles of economics: Alan Greenspan was a legend in his time and there was no shortage of praise for him back then. For example, who can forget Bob Woodow's 2000 book Maestro: Greenspan's...
  • Yes Tyler, Low Interest Rates Matte... Tyler Cowen is wondering whether the Fed's low interest rates in the early-to-mid 2000s really were that important to the credit and housing boom of the early-to-mid...
  • The Eurozone Crisis: Deja Vu... Review topics and articles of economics: Randal Forsyth sees similarities between the current unfolding of the Eurozone crisis and that of the U.S. financial crisis a few years back:Just as the problem on this...
  • Charles Plosser and the Burden of F... The Economist's Free Exchange blog is shocked to hear this from Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia President Charles Plosser:"Since expectations play an important role...
  • Arnold Kling and Expected Inflation... Review topics and articles of economics: What do we know about expected inflation? According to Arnold Kling not much if we look to financial markets:I'm also not convinced that we can read expected inflation...
  • A Paper on Stabilizing Nominal Spen... Given the recent discussion on stabilizing nominal spending as a policy goal I found this article by Evan F. Koenig of the Dallas Fed to be interesting: The article...
  • Why The Low Interest Rates Mattered... Review topics and articles of economics: This is the second of two posts detailing why the Fed's low interest rate policies in the early-to-mid 2000s was one of the more important contributors to the credit and...
  • Why The Low Interest Rates Mattered... This is the first of a two-part follow up to my previous post, where I argued that the Fed's low interest rate policy was a key contributor to the credit and housing...
  • The Stance of Monetary Policy Via t... Review topics and articles of economics: There has been some interesting conversations on the stance of monetary policy in the past few days between Arnold Kling, Scott Sumner, and Josh Hendrickson. Part of...
  • Scott Sumner's New Best Friend:... Joseph Gagnon is calling for $6 trillion more in global monetary easing. This should not be too hard to implement since the Fed is a monetary superpower.Update: The...
 
Review topics and articles of economics © 2011 NYSDOT Stonewalls