Rail to Loudoun Has Something for Everyone

Playing "Infrastructure Roulette" with your tax  dollars?

Loudoun County may soon join the high stakes game of "Infrastruture Roulette,"
gambling big, in spite of studies that show the possibility of a return is just about zero. In fact paying to extend rail into Loudoun will be worse than a complete waste of money.

 How could that be? The answer is that after incurring the massive cost to build the rail line and terminals, next comes mandatory annual  subsidies to operate and maintain it; not just  the 2.3 miles in Loudoun, but the entire 100+ miles of the worn-out, under-maintained and union-run Metro system. Make no mistake, if Loudoun opts in, it's forever and it is expensive.

As in any game there are winners and losers, but win or lose, "Rail to Loudoun Has Something for Everyone."

Taxpayers - These are the people politely refered to as "The Backstop" of the Rail to Loudoun financial arrangement. I guess that means they just stand still and take a beating regardless of what hits them. Being the backstop also means paying out a variable share when the other participants have fixed shares. That would be great in a high-yield investment but is not the place to be in this deal. Taxpayers will be permanently shackled to this ball-and-chain with a stroke of the pen by our current Board of Supervisors, yes, that's right, forever, if we opt in. Taxpayers would pay again and again and again. Commuters who live in Loudoun, for example, will be paying thousands more per year at the toll booth and thousands more in property taxes if rail goes through. That's paying if you're coming, paying if you're going, and paying if you never ride the rail or use the toll road.

Commuters - Are taxpayers who end up back in line to pay again at the toll booth. Metropolitain Washington Airports Authority (MWAA) seems to regard commuters and taxpayers as their “cash cows”. They (commuters) are the people that, if MWAA has their way, will be paying soaring tolls.  It's that toll-tax revenue that allows MWAA, a body of  un-elected and un-accountable members, to venture outside their area of core competence (cronyism) into things like building trains for non-driving commuters.