(The following article by Bill Stewart was posted on the Oregonian website on January 28.)
VANCOUVER — Local transportation officials will again seek federal help to make the rail bridge between Vancouver and Portland safer. But this time, Congress first will be asked to amend or replace a 64-year-old ship safety law that stands in the way.
Officials want to move and replace the opening portion of the rail bridge because westbound towboats and the barges they move are required to perform a dangerous S-turn to line up with the rail opening after passing beneath the highest part of the Interstate 5 bridge. The towboats are encouraged to pass underneath the span rather than engage the I-5 drawbridge to avoid disrupting highway traffic on the bridge.
Last year, the Coast Guard rejected I-5 traffic improvement as a valid reason to approve the rail project, saying the law limits what project benefits can be considered. Federal projects must be evaluated on a cost-benefit balance.
Previously, tow captains routinely took their barges through the I-5 lift span, and safety wasn’t an issue because they had a straight shot at the rail bridge opening. But in 2002, the towboat industry agreed to avoid the I-5 lift to ease traffic congestion. Tow captains subsequently discovered the difficulty of aligning with the rail opening, especially when the river is high and running fast in the spring.
To ease — but not totally eliminate — the turn, the Bi-State Transportation Committee asked that the rail opening be moved one pier south and that a vertical lift replace the turntable span that rotates on a pier. Such a replacement would shorten the time the span is opened.
After months of study last year, Coast Guard officials estimated the changes would cost $42 million.
The bridge is owned by Burlington Northern Santa Fe, but it also is used by Union Pacific Railroad and Amtrak.
Under the 1940 Truman-Hobbs Act, one bridge annually in the United States — rail or highway — can be repaired or replaced with federal dollars if it poses a safety problem to shipping. The Coast Guard, which has jurisdiction over the projects, ruled that the cost of delayed trains could be included in figuring the value of the repairs but that delays to freight and commuters on I-5 were irrelevant to the rail bridge.
Members of the bi-state committee — elected officials and administrators from governments and agencies on both sides of the Columbia River — will lobby Congress to change the law to include benefits beyond the problem span.
Austin Pratt, the Coast Guard’s regional bridge administrator in Seattle, is skeptical that lawmakers will go along.
“I think they will realize that such a change would cause a flood of similar requests . . . and everyone knows money is tight now,” he said. He also said changing the law might eliminate the Coast Guard’s jurisdiction, because traffic would be considered in addition to shipping.
During a recent meeting in Vancouver, the bi-state panel, which is looking for ways to speed commerce on I-5 through the Vancouver-Portland area, indicated it was more interested in resubmitting the bridge project as a safety issue than seeking highway construction money.
The group said information from the first application shows less competition for navigation projects than for highway dollars.