Board of Directors Meeting   6/4/2024

I'm going to call the June 4th meeting of the Virginia Passenger Rail Authority Board of Directors to order.

Before we get into the safety grouping, I just want to very quickly say thank you to DJ, to Michael Blockland, and to Jennifer Bonitz for the wonderful tour that we got yesterday afternoon.

It's one thing to sit on this board and talk about the work that this organization is doing.

It's being another thing to

Be out there and see it in person, see the complexity, you know, feel it.

I've had the privilege of doing that many times, but it's good to be out there.

I encourage you to take Rich up on his offer, spend some time with BRE to do the same thing.

So thank you guys.

It was great.

Great day yesterday.

I enjoyed everybody's company yesterday.

It's nice to rest against a little extra time together.

That's right, Madam Chair.

Good morning.

We are located at 1725 Duke Street in the first floor conference room.

There's a single person rushing.

If you press the door, turn to your left.

A single person rushing to your left.

Also there's a first aid, actually I'm the first aid kit on the table there, soliciting questions on the table.

Primary number one colleague of Michael Laughlin, secondary, Steve Pittard, CPR, primary, myself, secondary, Joan Providence, meeting with First Responders, primary, Mary Estelle Douglas, secondary, Michael Westerman.

There's, we need an ADP, I'll call him Matt for that, if you need some.

I mentioned the territory of kids.

There's a fire alarm and fire extinguisher in the main lobby.

As soon as you exit, these doors here, the exit to the main lobby, there's a fire extinguisher and a fire alarm there.

Evacuation.

You have two exits.

You have to exit here, also out the main lobby.

You will evacuate at the King Gardens Park.

It's right beside you eventually, right in front of the Epson Hotel.

And also ensure that the person to your left and your right is there, is evacuated.

If you see something, say something, please report it.

If there's an active shooter, please leave, hide, or fight.

Also, remote participation, being aware of official emails and scams, load of gun-reversing, and evacuation strategies.

Do we have any questions?

All right, does that sound safe yet?

All right, next item on our agenda is public comment.

We received one written public comment from Mr. Cherry regarding the subject statement.

All of the board members should have a copy of that written public comment.

And then we have one person signed up to provide public comment for us today.

As a reminder, public comment is limited to three minutes.

Mr. Provost, it's a pleasure to see you.

And it's good to see you.

Well, we all rode the train up here instead of the other two.

Well, good morning, everyone.

Again, I'm Jay Corvallis.

I'm with JBG Smith.

We're a large property owner at National Landing right nearby here.

I'm also the co-chair of the National Landing District Transportation Committee and a board member of Virginia for High Speed Rail.

I'm here on behalf of all those organizations to welcome you all to Northern Virginia and to again discuss the importance of your work to our regional

First, if you're familiar with National Landing, we're about two miles away from here, over two metro stops north of today's meeting.

And we're Virginia's largest walk from downtown, with 12 million square feet of office space, over 22,000 residents.

Located in Arlington and Alexandria, and are the home of Amazon's HQ2, whose first phase of Metropolitan Park opened last year, and Virginia Tech's Innovations Campus, which is expected to open in early 2025.

National Landing's success

in its robust, multi-modal transportation network, which is set to grow thanks to Transforming Rail in Virginia.

Specifically, Long Bridge and the 4th Track Project will enable significantly expanded VRE service and, per a recent MOU with the VPRA and the Maryland Department of Transportation, the extension of market commuter trains across the river to Nashville.

Perhaps most importantly, it will also enable Amtrak service to Crystal City for its time.

In anticipation,

Jacob G. Smith is working with Amtrak and VRE on plans for their new Crystal City Station, which will include a passenger waiting facility in an existing JBG building on Crystal Drive.

Together with the planned pedestrian bridge National Airport being advanced by our county, this will create the nation's near air-to-rail hub, putting residents across the commonwealth within a one seat ride a meter of the yearly 400 daily flights down the east end.

Collectively, these improvements will allow employers like Amazon and JBG

Boeing and others to recruit top talent from across the region who directs transit access.

It will also help Northern Virginia continue to attract leading employers and institutions to help grow our economy.

In summary, the work the VPRA is doing to expand gas and rail service has significant benefits to national landing in the greater Northern Virginia region.

We appreciate the authority's attention to our region, including by hosting this meeting here today.

Finally, I hope you will all consider returning to the region

and the Virginians for High Springs Rail will host the 30th anniversary luncheon at the National Landing Experience Center.

Thank you.

Ms. Bulova?

here, Ms. Bushue here, Mr. Cardwell, Mr. Dalton here, Mr. Delandro here, Ms. Doersch here, Ms. Drake here, Mr. Hall, Mr. Maestri here, Ms. Moses-Nedd here, Mr. Payne, Ms. Rhinehart, Mr. Spore here, Mr. Watkins here,

Thank you.

Not a problem.

Multi-faceted.

Some different.

So hopefully it'll warm up in here a little bit.

Next item on our agenda today is approval of our meeting minutes.

We actually have two minutes, two sets of minutes before you for approval.

So we'll start with the minutes from the January 23rd meeting.

Can I ask a question?

The new ones that I've seen, I thought they need to be just reread in sort of really awkward language that just looked like something I've left in there.

And I also wonder, DJ, because we had a really good conversation yesterday, at what point do you want to have a discussion as to how we do handle the minutes that are

because one of the things that's left out of that paragraph was my comment about we should be involved in legislation and we should know that it's coming.

We could also be of help in helping you get it through because of our contacts.

So that's not in there.

So we have a motion from Ms. Bulova.

I thought I heard a second, but I didn't.

Ms. Bulova?

Ms. Bushue?

Aye.

Mr. Cardwell?

Ms. Doersch?

Aye.

Ms. Drake?

Abstain.

Mr. Hall?

Aye.

Aye.

All right.

So we have another seven minutes before us.

Those are the minutes from our May 23rd meeting.

Second.

Second by Ms. Bulova.

Second by Ms. Drake.

Any further discussion?

Ms. Bulova?

Aye.

Ms. Bushue?

Aye.

Ms. Doersch?

Aye.

Ms. Drake?

Aye.

Ms. Moses-Nedd?

Aye.

Mr. Spore?

Aye.

Mr. Watkins?

All right.

Statler.

Good morning, everyone.

It's good to see everyone tonight, and I second the thanks to Mike McLaughlin and the team that put together the tour yesterday.

We sit here and we go through the PowerPoints, we see pictures, but until you're actually out there seeing the tracks and seeing the tight space between the two existing bridges, well, we're going to put that bridge.

I think it's a good thing to get out there.

So I'm going to go through the monthly executive director's report, as we've done in

and the Executive Director's Report out late in the month.

So this will be an abbreviated version.

This is all April data.

We won't have May data for a couple more weeks.

I do intend to the last few minutes.

I always do send out a report that gives the full May data.

So I'm just going to go through some high level things from last month's report.

I encourage you to get any questions or looking for any clarification.

The floor chair and I participated in the RBA 757 rail committee roundtable earlier in May and had a good discussion with the folks from that region about the topics that are ongoing and how rail really has a strong impact on not only Hampton Roads 757 region but also the state.

Any opportunity we have to get out to the community, we spend time talking about the projects, we spend time letting people know that we are doing a lot of good things to improve capacity.

But as we do that, those that are riding the train are likely going to see some schedule changes and perhaps some delays, and that's something that really manages to go forward.

And then finally on May 21, we attended Rich Dalton's ceremony, the Fredericksburg Station Rehabilitation Project, stationed near and dear to my heart because I left that station every morning at 5 a.m. for about 20 years and I got home every evening.

I had nothing to do with me, but that stairwell on the west side stays about five minutes off for the next afternoon commute.

So we were there for that good event.

A lot more work to be done next time.

Organizational updates, we've leveled out pretty much.

Our staff level is right about 56.

We've got four current postings, and you see the hiring activity from May there.

Here's the chart that we give every month, just about our

Update on our annual center playing goals.

I'm not going to go through these one by one because they haven't really changed much from last month.

Everything is pretty much complete, with the exception of the first item is ridership.

We still have a couple months left.

to see if we beat that.

Managing that is a combination of working with Amtrak to manage their costs, working with our marketing team, with Amtrak's marketing team to boost ridership and to optimize the revenue that we get when people ride the train.

Obviously, if we sell all the tickets for a dollar, the train will be packed, but the revenue will be poor, so finding that sweet spot is important.

And then also managing our own cost, because our administrative costs are also

Other than that, the only miss was the one we talked about a couple of times, the fourth track project.

We made a business decision to not select

and those to the board at the OSU.

Any questions about AIP goals?

All right, supply diversity is also a good news story here, just for everybody's education are, again, the definitions of all of the different types of small business, DVE, SWAM.

It's complex because there are different levels and many businesses fall into one, two, or even three categories, but we are very methodical in how we give business credit,

You all have met John Hausler before and I challenge you to find someone more passionate about getting your first local small vendors into the mix.

And Mary-Sell will tell you, Mary-Sell does a lot of the small purchases for the office.

For her to purchase from anybody but us plan, takes a nap about her entrance.

Our goal this year is 10%.

The discretionary expenditures through the first three years, we are almost 16%, so we are above goal.

And when Mr. Kostner could say, hey, look at this, we're almost 60% above goal, he says, not good enough.

It's hard mental, please.

I have a comment, Chair at an appropriate time.

So I have DVDs.

Thank you.

The genesis of my sort of motivation here is that you may recall that unlike FTA, FAA, and FHWA, FRA is not subject to the federal, the number of, DBE federal environmental issues.

No, I cannot.

who's head of the FRA, that they are moving in any direction to online compatibility with respect to their mobile ears.

But I just think it is the right thing for us to do, just giving all of the coordinated initiatives that we are taking.

We are getting 1,000% on all cylinders.

I do apologize Madam Chair, I believe that we adopt the swan DV resolution as offered by my seller.

Can we have a discussion?

My question was, I'd like to hear from staff.

What does that mean differently?

I mean, we just heard from DJ how well you're doing things.

So I don't know, is there additional audits, state level, federal level, what are they putting in there?

I mean, it sounds like we have a really good track record and it sounds like there's not a problem that you're trying to fix.

Right.

I think, and I appreciate you, Jill, that question.

I think it's less so of you're doing things right and more so making an affirmative statement that this is a priority for us and that's with respect to what we're asking

You just asked about it.

Right.

But all full disclosure, I've been at DBE for 14 years.

I'm not currently, I have been, so I support the program.

but I felt like the resolution is a hammer looking for a nail.

I do think that because of that resolution that DJ will feel that he will need to hire a DBE, excuse me, a DBE auditor.

I think that particularly looking at some of the contractors that we have hired to do work for VPRA, they're very much aware of the DBE requirements and they're actually excellent.

at ensuring that the DPE requirements are withheld.

They know how to do it.

They know the process.

They know how to leverage the DPEs.

I think as VPRA advances and if we ever get into the purchasing of rolling stock or being a part of the rolling stock purchase, DPE is very, very difficult for rolling stock manufacturers to attain.

They do, but it's very, very, very difficult.

I think that what we currently have, I think it works.

It seems like VPR staff understands the importance of DPEs and SWAMs.

I was a SWAM as well.

So I just really don't, I just don't understand the purpose of the resolution, except I do think it does, may require down the road for DJ to hire his own auditor to do the audits.

And I just don't think that's necessary.

The feds do the audits.

I'm not so familiar with the SWAM.

Auditing, I don't know how Virginia handles it, but I do know the feds do.

So yeah, I just don't think it's Michigan.

Any other comments or questions?

Currently, what we do is we have our in-house staff as part of their work to keep track of what we're doing as well as our contractors.

It's essentially, it looks like the motion would call for a report or a presentation in August or August 2018.

So that, you know, we focus on journalism and have a chance to hear back.

Although we are, I think we regularly get reports every month.

And this was, I think it puts the word on forever.

But it's continuing to say that it was a hierarchy.

and it phased at least one month in particular for there to be a report.

And that's not to say that we continue to get regular updates and regular reports.

So I think it's a fine motion.

And I think that also some of the whereases make it clear that we're

I agree with everything Ms. Bulova has said.

I also think that you both were mentioned

that DJ has been very intentional.

We know that as his principal, we expect him to be a member from Long Bridge.

However, should leadership change, business priorities change, even though there is a requirement to comply, there are instances where people decide, I'm gonna see if I can skirt that process and take the risk.

I think that's not only puts the border on notice, but it sets the standard

in someone other than DJ is in this position.

Somebody mentioned August.

What happens in August?

What I value here is that I think we're doing some of the biggest rail projects in the country.

They're absolutely enormous, right?

And so a lot of times they draw from contractors that have pulled from the entire East Coast thing.

And what I like about this is it's a way to make sure that some of these jobs are local jobs, right?

And stay with the people of Virginia.

People in this area should benefit from the projects that are funded here, especially since there's a lot of community taxpayer dollars.

You know, I know that under federal law, it's very, very difficult to do a local hiring provision.

I'm a little concerned about only one part of this.

That is, I remember that about

Eight years ago, there was a lot of debate in assembly about the extension measure and specialization that had to be obtained in those contracts.

And we therefore had to back off some criteria that we had put in for employers or contractors for state projects.

because of the specialization.

And as I looked at the projects yesterday, you've got a couple of areas where specialization is paramount.

I don't have a problem with DBEs, I don't have a problem with slant, but I think we need to be careful

and making the contract go to the local community.

I'm not worried about the local community.

And so this is the problem of the federal government.

Well, the resolution states we're feasible

I think the standards that you just roughly, loosely laid out, because they will be the consideration.

I just worry about specialization.

We had to back off.

Dick Sasolaw and I got into a grand discussion with Will about this, and he was worried that if we weren't careful with the cost of that road going out to Dulles and further west, he would be out of sight and on the board.

And so we made alterations to it.

I'm not going to vote against something like this.

With respect to specificity, absolutely, certainly not trying to

Or feasible and reasonable.

So that's the motion toward an end.

I would second that.

All right, so amendment is moved by Mr. Watkins, seconded by Ms. Borla, so now we have

Or a vote on the amendment.

I say amendment.

The amended motion.

That's where I was headed.

Ms. Bulova?

Aye.

Ms. Bushu?

Nay.

Mr. Cardwell?

Mr. Delandro?

Aye.

Ms. Doersch?

Aye.

Ms. Drake?

Aye.

Ms. Moses-Nedd?

Aye.

Aye.

All right, so the amendment motion carries.

So now we have the amended version of the date motion.

This is the first time we've done this.

OK, so we now have an amended resolution.

Do we have our amended resolution on the table to be on the motion?

Just are we now?

So we had a vague motion.

We're going to just

Davis, Madam Chair.

Ms. Bulova.

Aye.

Nay.

Ms. Borsch.

Aye.

Ms. Drake.

No.

Ms. Moses-Nedd.

Aye.

Ms. Rhinehart.

Aye.

Ms. Spore.

Aye.

Aye.

All right, so the motion carries.

For future contracting updates, the one update we have in Monday, May, as I emailed the folks, we signed the Amtrak operating agreements, 209 agreement.

Jamie Lattimore is going to be here today.

I double checked again.

And he's going to walk us through what 209 really is.

The Safer Sea group, the state's Amtrak passenger rail committee has been working on new rates for Amtrak to charge states for an operating cost.

Warren, and then the only budget adjustments, the first budget adjustment we made this year, we removed $180,000 capital projects to cover the cost of design for the original plate owners.

This will get us to 30% design, which then will come back and report.

By passenger service updates, this continues to be a new

through April, our operating revenue and our operating expenses.

Revenue's in pretty good shape.

We're doing pretty well, although it's not rising as much ridership.

I stand adjourned here at the same 67 percent cost recovery that we will watch for the last couple months of this year.

Here's an update of our administrative budget for FY24 for April.

All the categories are in pretty good shape with that variance across the board.

Now we've got it back up to about 67%.

We're working through the FY 25 budget that you'll hear about later today.

And through that process, we'll be saying in our concept, our goals for next year.

Flidership continues to do well.

April, though, we were about almost 10% more in April 2024 than it were

Any questions on ridership or administrative?

Project updates.

Here's the capital project spending chart.

This is the same chart that we sent out last week.

I just wanted to go into detail.

Here's the Western Rail.

A couple of projects I wanted to focus on.

We talked about at the meeting today.

for just 6% design, expect 6% design at least by next week.

This is the case, and we will have an update for you all perhaps before the August board meeting, but likely at the August board meeting.

That continues to go well.

When we were out there yesterday, we saw some photo reports, work, work, work, work going on, and that continues to progress, and we're still on path with that to 30.

The South Package procurement, that process is ongoing.

We had all the meetings with those central candidates last week, and we expect them to come to this board in December with a reputation on South Package.

DJ, on that,

That's correct.

Here are just some pictures and actually results from this yesterday, some of the field activities that are

As you see there, we also had the FRA come out with one of the

I think it's one of the projects that filled the gap that we had as a 30% sign.

They had a whole team of folks out in Maine to tour the projects, as you all saw yesterday.

So that's the place to keep that very close phone.

That work is taking place now, and it's taking place now, and we're watching that closely as we work with Southern and CSX to ensure that the property rights there are accurate.

DJ, I see where you brought up FRA staff.

That was very smart.

It was very similar to your reaction.

Wow.

They are great partners and it took a while to schedule that tour, but they were thankful for it.

Great idea.

The contractor, Laddard-Herzog, and those designs continue on to forward, so we can do technical work there as well.

All of the treaties were cleared and we were the train-ups, we thought those signs were clear, so it's exciting to see things go from design, which, no offense to the planners of the world, isn't all that exciting.

You can actually see these huge machines out there.

I met here some pictures from bypass.

On the bottom you see the pouring samples.

Those are good.

Those were not good.

So when we got these samples back we were feast of peace.

Any questions?

All right, and then revenue investment

Grant funding status here for the next 15 years.

You see, as we all know, we got $120 million grant bypass and we've got $729 million grant that fully funded phase two.

We have three terrific grants that are outstanding.

See the dollar amounts there and those are the three projects.

Four, one of the things that is very important to me personally, and it's probably taken us a little long to address,

We have took us a while to get our stations to compliance.

There are a lot of complexities with the stations.

The county will own the parking lot, the city will own the sidewalk, the Great River platform, and so if it's really convoluted, that's no excuse.

The fact that we have people who want to take the trains that cannot get to the train from our stations is an exception.

So does someone online have a question?

Yeah, that's right.

Yeah, that's right.

That's correct, right?

That's correct.

That's correct.

That's correct.

That's correct.

That's correct.

That's correct.

Yes, the ones that we went through yesterday are 30% designed for greater.

Some of the sidings in phase two are not at 30%.

This is with Christie-Grants, so do you know when they're going to be awarded?

The Christie Grants, do you know when they'll be awarded?

By the end of the year.

Yeah.

Possible, sure.

I mean, really?

Just want to clarify side conversations.

There will be another large grant opportunity for the state partnership coming out.

No provost coming up in the next few months.

That won't be determined until after the new year.

There's another one coming, so we have some other questions.

So thank you, DJ.

Yes, so for those of you who have been here since the beginning, we've been in existence

There were a few minor changes this year in employee laws allowing for

So what are the changes to the policy that came out of this year's laws?

Number one, if you're a person with a disability or you're a caregiver for a person with a disability, even if you're participating remotely, you can count toward the four and that must be assembled physically.

A new law, the second bullet here in your change of law was our policy cannot restrict remote or all virtual participants from voting on the matter.

So if you're participating locally or we have an all virtual meeting,

the person participating remotely to still vote.

We did not need to change our policy on this point because our policy already does not prohibit remote participants from counting toward vote on reservations.

Third bullet, if you're participating remotely, it's really important you keep your camera on, or at least it's important if you would like to be counted for the forum.

So if you're in a category of a carrier for a person with a disability participating remotely,

The cap, there previously was a 25% cap for all virtual meetings of the year that increased to 50%, so we can have half of our meetings and subcommittee meetings virtual, all virtual.

And then here's the reason we're

Talking today, the policy must be readopted by the upper body every year.

So we'll do this once a year.

We'll talk about the changes in the law and we'll readopt those.

So with that, that was the draft resolution of the board package.

It led lines to the policy reflecting the changes in the law and that needs to start.

That just means there's going to be a change in their review.

So moved.

Second.

Ms. Bulova?

Aye.

Ms. Bushue?

Aye.

Mr. Cardwell?

Ms. Doersch?

Aye.

Mr. Drake?

Aye.

Ms. Moses-Nedd?

Aye.

Ms. Rhinehart?

Aye.

Mr. Spore?

Aye.

Aye.

All right.

We came to this board in December to have a conversation about the Potomac Shores project.

There's a battery station going in there and we had to work with the scenery and the developer to help them get the station done.

We were here in December and I just wanted to come back and give an update.

This is a development that is on a brewery line right between Rippon and Quantico.

It is a development with quite a few single family and townhouses that would benefit greatly from an additional transportation form.

They're anywhere near there.

a little bit later, there's a big hill and they've got a lot of soil that needs to be moved out of there.

And the developer did, it's just a lot, it's a big effort for the developer to bottom line.

So what is being proposed is the developer can move all of that soil to another piece of railroad land, but only to railroad land.

Because if it's railroad dirt and it stays on railroad land, then it's much easier to dispose of it.

We had this conversation with the board in December and there were a lot of concerns about risk, rightfully so,

that the developer currently owns a piece of land that's called Cockpit Point, and they want to donate, slash, or give about five acres, four and a half acres, five acres of that to us, and that is contiguous to our right-of-way, so it would be right along local line from CSX, and we would just add four and a half acres of land to our old public land.

Then, once we own it, it becomes a railroad land,

They have decided at this point not to develop that, so they're proposing to give us a little piece that is highlighted there.

As you can see, it's right along our right-of-way.

That piece of land used to be developed, used to be out of the landfill.

And so there are concerns about what is there.

The developer has worked with the Virginia TEQ, Department of Environmental Quality.

They had to do a lot of work there, a lot of testing there.

So they work with DBQ.

They have a high level of confidence that the land there is acceptable.

It doesn't have any unmanageable risk.

So if you look here, what's going to happen is that there's the station.

The developer wants to move about 51,000 cubic yards to our site, the site that would be ours if we accept it.

If any contaminated material is found before they move the soil, we stop working

and then there's got to be some remediation and if there can't be remediation then the soil will have a consequence.

Some concerns because we're accepting land, we're proposing to accept land that used to be a dump and we want to make sure that we're not taking on my ability and that's just really an awful lot of stuff.

So what we've done to work with DEQ and we would not

We've been working on this gift parcel, and if there's any unknown risk that's discovered, they would revoke that.

But before we accepted this, we would make sure with them, with the developer, that this copper filled cotton pit point is a clean city.

So we're getting more and more comfortable with the Alpen gift parcel.

What we're not comfortable with yet, that we've been working on, is the soil that comes from the station

You need to take some of this risk.

What we're contemplating now, and we've continued to go back and forth, is to have the developer purchase an environmental insurance policy.

So we would be doing inspections before they move the dirt.

So as they start to move dirt on the station site, we would be expecting, we would make sure that it's clean, that we saw anything bad with this outbur.

And then they'd have to take it to combat.

But assuming everything's okay,

for that extra protection in place.

will get on.

We just want to make sure that they have a train to get on.

So it's another place for all of the residents in this area to stop.

We are strongly supportive of it.

We're also strongly supportive of not taking on any unnecessary risk on our side.

We feel like we're getting to a place where that risk is indicated.

So next steps and this is

We hope to come to an understanding of what that policy looks like and also to the land transfer agreement that would say here are the conditions under which we transfer that land.

I have a question just listening to all of this and hearing it before.

So that's in place.

The developer made a commitment

Okay, so you don't know the details on that.

Because I'm questioning why we would want to own four and a half to five acres of land, but apparently it's undevelopable for him.

And what I've read, it can't even be a playground.

So it's a pretty serious piece of land if it can't even be a playground.

So the advantage, if I've got this right, is this land means nothing to him.

He could do nothing with it.

But it gives him a cheaper way to move the dirt.

I mean, why doesn't he move the dirt, sell the dirt, do whatever with the dirt?

It really doesn't do anything for us.

That's my question, because I know even when we made it north of Train, we gave that extra lamp to Petersburg.

We didn't want to own any lamps.

If you could confirm that too, whether it was ever, because I think it was like owned by DC or something like that, if they put

Ash, whatever they put there.

So we don't even know what they put there.

Potash.

Potash.

From there.

I know, but they change the environmental laws all the time.

on the water, but it's very close to the water.

It seems like a self-inflicted wound, right?

And why are we taking this on?

We're taking this on as a favor to the developer, right?

I appreciate that.

We are open for business.

We're here to help, right?

Is there a way, because I share every concern about this, right?

And is there a way we can be helpful to them without taking out

taking on potentially significant, undefinable liability.

I understand how for all these insurance policies that make sense and everything, but this seems like a self-inflicted wound and you have a great strategy to mitigate it to, oh, it's just a flesh wound, but why are we going in there?

Why are we doing this to ourselves to begin with?

But I guess the most important question for me is in terms of VPRA's decision-making protocol.

If this is your decision to make independent of the boards, I'm not going to substitute my judgment for yours.

And there are other ways to be helpful.

I mean, they've been beautiful property, beautiful golf course.

It's all in there.

But I was looking into this, too.

He's already been warned twice by DEQ.

I didn't penalize once by DEQ for discharge into the river, right?

We don't need to take that on, right?

I mean, is this something that VRE could have taken on as a VRE route that VRE's boards chose not to?

So I think the difference is

CSX owns it now, and when we take title, then it comes out first.

But CSX, they had talked about taking it, I believe, and then they said, well, wait a second, VPRA is going to own it eventually, let's just wait and let it in, period.

So, that's all.

It's fake development.

I have a question, I think, for Michael.

Can you research that?

Well, you're right.

Prior owners have liability as to current

How is one condition though made up?

Well, it just makes that station development go more quickly.

And right now, and you have to speak to the developer, but I think the station itself is at risk because the developer didn't realize how expensive it would be to be able to do that.

Could we help them with the development of the VRE station before we help them with taking on ownership of this when we're done?

The only way that I could think of is financially just to help them out with money.

Rich, I don't want to put you on the spot, but I don't.

Can you confirm that this is a condition, I mean it's developing what, 1900 acres with homes?

I can tell you what it is.

It's a developer's best interest.

Their interest is to have the stations.

It's a condition of the zoning.

So what's the other option of moving this dirt?

I mean, the issue I don't think is the parcel.

I think the issue is the dirt, which you don't know yet what's in the dirt.

But what's their other options to pay to move the dirt?

They're going to pay you to move it to your site, to pay us to move it to our site if we do this.

Is them giving us this site would give them a piece of railroad property to move the dirt?

That's very close.

If this site

But it has to go to a railroad site?

There's no action required.

Can I just say a positive thought?

I'm not sure if the footprint's big enough.

It's 4.5 acres.

It usually flows solar.

It was solar fields that I had 50 to 80, 90.

That's what I've been seeing.

I don't know.

4.5.

So I was going to ask those, what could it be used for?

So it gets to where a conversation might happen.

What could the property be used for?

So not a playground.

Say we get it and we put the grass on it.

What else could it be used for?

So why don't we kind of explore that a little bit.

Maybe there is something that

We have that opportunity to do what we want.

There's no access.

Through that whole area, near that residential development.

Okay.

So the next item on our agenda is for us to go into closed session.

I am glad to move that the board convene an enclosed session pursuant to Virginia Code 2.2-37-1A3 for the discussion or consideration of the acquisition of real property for a public purpose or of the disposition of publicly held real property where discussion in an open meeting

would adversely affect the bargaining position or negotiating strategy of the public body.

So moved.

Is there a motion by Ms. Bulova that I was second?

I move.

Second by Ms. Watkins.

Ms. Bulova.

Aye.

Ms. Bushue.

Aye.

Mr. Quanto.

Mr. Delanto.

Aye.

Ms. Doersch.

Aye.

Ms. Drake.

Aye.

Mr. Hall.

Aye.

Ms. Moses-Nedd.

Aye.

Ms. Weisbord?

Mr. Spore?

All right, so the motion carries.

We're now going to take roll call vote.

I ask that each member indicate their agreement with the following statement.

Aye.

Arishu?

Aye.

Mr. Cardwell?

Aye.

Mr. Delandro?

Aye.

Ms. Doersch?

Aye.

Ms. Drake?

I wanted to introduce folks to Colin Burch at the end of the table, and then also Jennifer Ebert.

They are two VPRA staff members who have been working hard on the new River Valley Basket Rail project, and we are giving today some updates to the board on this project.

As you may recall, in January, we came to the board with an update in just updating you on the work that's been done since then.

Background, very quickly, we all know that in 2021,

We partnered with North and Southern to announce that passenger rail was extending to the New River Valley.

We acquired the Virginia Line, which is 28 miles of track between Sound Crossing going out to the Trishonsburg area.

As Colin and Jen will talk about, we came back in January and found that the schedule of the cost was very different than what we expected back in 2021-22.

We presented those alternatives to this board.

and said we would continue to work forward and what we're here today is to talk about that work.

So we'll have to turn it forward to Colin.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you everyone for letting me speak.

My name is Colin Burch, Planning Manager for the Virginia Passenger Rail Authority.

While I haven't been on this project since day one, I've been on it since my day one, so I'm not looking forward to seeing this progress further.

So, each project at VPR already kind of has a

One of those is to conduct, if the project has to go through the NEPA process, to do some sort of pre-NEPA work.

And just to bring everybody back up to speed, if NEPA is the National Environmental Policy Act, anytime there's a federal action, such as federal funding or a federal permit, probably must do a formal NEPA process.

This project, in the early phases, because there is a little federal funding, and also we are anticipating

Army Corps of Engineers, we are anticipating a good unique process so we are kind of in the pre-neat phase and what that looks like is a high-level kind of a desktop review of the environmental impacts that could come about because of this project.

Also some public outreach in general we'll talk about a little bit later.

So before we can get down to the troubles in the dirt construction part here,

So, again, to bring you up to speed with the projects, this map shows a pilot overview of the American project.

To the right, your right, would be the East Roanoke, the left would be to the west to Merrimack.

This is a suite of projects, really.

It's not just one project.

We have the Norfolk Southern Lead Project, which extends from the Roanoke platform here to downtown Roanoke, on that blue line.

That's going to be six miles of passenger maintenance.

At the Salem Crossover at roughly milepost 251 GSR, that's where the Commonwealth acquired the land two years ago.

So along that 20, roughly 28 miles, there are a number of bridge, track, culvert improvements that need to be done.

Also two tunnels under that will require some safety improvements, passenger line, passenger service heads autonomous.

are required to reach some of these sites.

We brought up these maps here, which outline three alternatives that we had in mind to enter into the NEPA base.

Next slide, please.

So this is the cost breakdown that was presented back in January for the three alternatives.

The commonality amongst all three of these is the later facility at Cinnabar Road, which is east of the Merrimack Tunnel.

Alternative A would look at a station site at Cinnabar Road along the

The Labor Facility Alternative B would look at the Labor Facility at Cinnabar Road, ultimately a station at the NME Mall site, which is west of the Merrimack Tunnel, so that would include constructing the connector track, improving the Merrimack Tunnel, which is about a mile long, and then Alternative C would be kind of a hybrid of the two we've had with the Labor Facility at Cinnabar, temporary interim platform at Cinnabar for service to begin sooner rather than later, and while the work on the

Alternative B, $705 million in 2030 start date, and then Alternative C, which is the cost latest coming up on the billion for 2028 at centibar and then 2030 at centibar.

In the part of our pre-MEPA work, we established a

Qualitative Environmental Screening of each of the alternatives.

So yellow impacts, blue benefit.

And you can see that alternative C and B, both score very highly with the most amount of benefit in terms of economic development, pedestrian and bike access,

and accessibility of public transportation, but it also scores very low in terms of, it has a greater impact in terms of the environmental impacts and it does not have as high a benefit for good stewardship of financial resources.

Representative A does not score quite as high for public transportation or bike and ped connectivity

is in that kind of club, but it does have a low impact in terms of the environment and a high benefit in terms of operational as soon as possible and good financial stewardship for the precincts.

Next slide.

Thank you, Colin.

Hi, everybody.

I'm Jenna.

I've been leading the public outreach on this particular project since I started in September.

In order to get to that summary slide you just saw, we've done two rounds of public outreach.

The first round was in January, started with speaking with the NRV Station Authority Board and the NRV Rail Advocacy Group, and then we did an open house in Blacksburg the week after.

At that particular round, we introduced the alternatives to the public for the first time.

At that point, the public was still under the impression that the mall was going to be the only site, so seeing Cinnamar was quite a surprise.

The goal of the first round was to gauge the public's input on their purpose and need.

Because we have a purpose and need that goes into the need that we need to present as part of that process and document.

And we had a draft, and that needed to be updated with what the public actually needed to see in a station site.

So we weren't asking them yet, which station site do you like, because they didn't have enough information on it.

And we honestly didn't have enough information to share either.

So we came to them asking, what is it that you would want to see in a station site?

What is important to you?

What are things that we need to make sure we're including in our VPRA process so that you are best served out of this area?

In that, we found out that the priorities were accessible by public transportation, least amount of impact of environmental resources, economic development and good stewardship of financial resources, operational as soon as possible.

We also found out the service is highly supportive in the region.

People are very, very, very excited about it.

The new station is supportive regardless of where it's going to be.

People just want the service to get there.

A lot of what we've learned is I just want the service to get here.

We had to look at current transportation patterns of how we would get to the new station site regardless of where it was and how would people access, how would people use this?

Are they going to be taking rideshare?

Are they going to be walking?

Are they going to be biking?

How many parking spots do we need?

So you can see some of the supportive comments that we got.

These are from the survey.

DJ, if you go to the next slide, please, you can see these are the results from our first round of outreach.

We received almost 2,000 surveys in our first round.

We gave a month and two weeks for that survey.

It was originally supposed to be a month.

We extended it for two weeks to allow for more responses to come in.

We had a pretty good range of ages and a pretty solid

spread across the region.

We're very happy with the results that we got here.

And among those 2,000 surveys, we got over 500 comments.

The comments ranged from not supporting the project at all to have colleagues supporting it and being super excited.

Gigi, if you move to the next one.

So then we were able to take what we learned from round one, put together our process for round two.

So round two occurred in April.

We went back to the NRV.

This time,

Instead of just one open house, we scheduled multiple pop-ups around the region over the course of four to five days.

So we went to a farmers market, we went to both universities out there, we had an open house, we tabled at a festival, and we found that going to multiple pop-ups in addition to the open house provides many more opportunities for the public to come up to us and tell us their opinions.

Because if you can't make the open house, you could at least come meet us at the market.

You could come meet us at the festival.

We were at the library and that's a really great network to build upon.

Another great reason for the open houses is, I'm sorry, the pop-ups, not open houses, is people who didn't know who we were and didn't know our project could come up and learn about it.

The festival was a really good example of this.

People are milling about, there's time in between your interactions and between your activities at the festival and people will just kind of wander up to us.

and say, hey, what are you doing?

What is this all about?

And we were able to get a really great amount of engagement naturally through that process.

So the toolbox we used for round two, we relied much more heavily on the media for round two.

We used the Romanuk Times for paid advertising in addition to paid social media advertisements and just organic social media, which is what we relied upon on the first round.

First round of engagement had a really great turnout.

We had over 150 people at our open house that first time in Blacksburg.

For the open house the second time in Christiansburg we had about 53 people, but over the course of the whole week we were there we engaged with at least 220 people.

We had another survey this time, so if you could go to the next slide.

So survey number two, this was now asking people to rank their opinions on the site.

We've given them all the information.

As you can see on these boards, we have a little legend right here that explains the impact and the benefit of each site.

And we made ourselves available to speak and answer as many questions as we could so that people felt like they were best informed and could make an informed decision on which site that they feel like would be the best for the area.

For round two, we got 935 surveys.

It was a little bit longer than the first survey we gave out.

And we do think that because it was so close to the first round of engagement, people might have thought it was the same survey.

Always lessons to be learned.

I think moving forward would be a better way to go about how to get more responses.

But also, we only gave a month for this one because we were limited by the NEPA processing because we wanted to get started.

And we needed to wrap this up.

Really great.

We're very happy with how round two went.

And while we were out there, a man did come up to me at the farmers market and say that he really appreciated VPRA's approach to public outreach because he really liked that we were in the public talking to people directly instead of just relying on town governments to give the messages for us.

He said he really appreciated that.

And we also heard from multiple other people throughout that week that they really appreciated the direct approach that we were taking.

So here's what we found from round two.

You can see there is majority support for Alternative A.

There are support for the other two.

We didn't ask them to say, you know, one, two, three.

It was more, I fully support this.

I don't.

There was room for comments.

You can see in some of the comments there's support for Alternative A, but there is concern about Alternative A.

There's concern about public transportation to the area.

There's concern about

Bicycle access and pedestrian access to the area.

There's concern that it's a little too remote and that what happens if the train is delayed and it's really, really late, there's not enough lighting, isn't an enclosed space.

They're all valid concerns that we understand.

And the concerns for B and C tend to do with cost and time.

Very interesting responses that we got and we did get a lot of responses asking us to go back to Norfolk Southern and asking us to renegotiate

for access to their mainline.

We heard that question in January with the Station Authority Board and the NRB Rail Advocacy Group.

We heard it at the first open house multiple times.

About 20 to 30 comments of the 500 we got on the first survey mentioned Norfolk, South America, Canberra mainline in some way.

So we are aware that that is something that the people wanted us to do.

And if you go to our next slide, you will see some of the comments

regarding, going back to Norfolk Southern, regarding concerns about alternate aviancy.

It's too expensive.

This isn't good stewardship of financial resources.

The economic development isn't there.

What about Bristol?

So these are just a handful of some of the comments we got about Norfolk Southern and about the concerns that they presented.

There are a lot more that would have shown up there, and I'm happy to share more comments if anybody wants to see them.

But overall, we had a very, very positive round of, two rounds of public engagement.

As I mentioned, the people were really, really happy to see us out there.

We really, I think, utilized our time in the area very well.

And we're really excited to go back with whatever announcement we are going to make in the fall.

and really kick things off because the public is very, very excited about this project and they want most of the comments we got out there was just, how can I help?

What do you need me to do to get this here faster?

So I think there's one more slide for DJ, which I'll head off to.

There's a lot of concerns about the timeline and expense there.

I've been coordinating with the MPO, the station authority, whoever will help.

I've been in there and talked too much about the museum, the Montgomery economy, the museum of history and culture.

There's a lot of concerns about it that never actually happened.

So I think just letting them know that this is still happening.

When the surveys were given out, they were operating under the assumption that, because in the original rock feasibility study, we said that the main line was off the table.

And these people were still mentioning it, even after we had told them repeatedly, we are not going on the main line.

So there is a strong half of that.

Thank you.

Sure.

So thank you.

Colin, Jenna, Jerika,

We heard very clearly from this board in January that the shift to a cinnabar or a cinnabar mall location was much more expensive than any of us expected and would also take a lot more time than any of us expected.

We also heard, as Jenna pointed out from the community, that that would take a lot more time and really wasn't the desired way to get passenger rail back to River Valley.

We took that and we went back to Norfolk Southern and we talked to them and we said, OK, this is not what any of us had in mind when we made the announcement back in 2021.

Norfolk Southern is there any way that we can revisit getting to Christiansburg on the mainline.

And Norfolk Southern totally understood where we're coming from.

And they said, you're right, the mainline is a better

What we have done is we have a preliminary agreement with Norfolk Southern that's going to have us evaluate over the course of the next three months.

And it's a hard deadline, so when we come back in the August board meeting, we will have a recommended path forward.

But we are going to work with Norfolk Southern between now and that August board meeting to determine the feasibility of staying on the mainline and having a station stop at Camry

I think it's a very permanent path forward and we won't leave until the August board meeting.

North Southern has been a great part.

They have really jumped into design quickly to see how feasible the Cambria station site would be and by station site it would be a high level platform that's fully accessible, ADA compliant, parking the whole deal right there at Cambria really is a hard

from Norfolk Southern, which is a railroad line.

This is a line that our area partners use every day, Amtrak uses.

It would give us a lot more control of passenger rail here in Northern Virginia and really be a win-win for Norfolk Southern and for us.

So what we are going to do over the next three months is work with Norfolk Southern to determine exactly what the camber solution would cost and figure out how the sale of the Manassas Line would

So that's where we are today.

We're going to work over the next three weeks.

We felt we had to push Norfolk Sun a little further, and to their credit, they were a great partner.

They came to us and said, yes, let's see if we can make that work.

A lot more information to come, but we're happy with this path forward, and we're excited to come here in August and have conclusions.

And again, Jenna, Common, the whole team, Steve, Mike, Michael Esterman,

There have been a lot of moving pieces since the board meeting in January, and we are in a good place today because of the heart of the team, so I thank you all.

And for the community for being on with me that general day, sometimes two months.

So that's where we are today.

Congratulations on the outreach.

That's really phenomenal.

And it's, you know, that's what

makes everything work well, you know, when you engage the community, especially at this early stage, and not just with a meeting, but, you know, looking at multiple ways of being able to engage with people.

So, this is exciting.

I also want to echo, thanks, both of us,

Well, not as high as I'd like them to be.

They really do represent what people are trying to get done.

And many people sort of put their head down and just said, okay, I'll deal with 81.

And I think it's time for us to show them that the Commonwealth as a whole embraces that part of the state because the more it does, the greater it will be.

I'd also like to publicly thank our stakeholders in the region for really helping us.

Get the word out and make sure the communities responded to our surveys.

We would not have been able to have had such good numbers, especially for that first round, if it wasn't for our friends and the stakeholders and the leadership in the New River Valley area, because they really helped push the survey and get those numbers up and make sure that people knew about our events.

Our use of media for the second round was really important in making sure people knew that, hey, if I can't make it to that open house on that Tuesday night or Thursday night or whenever it was,

that I could at least see the team at this market or I'll know that they'll be attending here.

Any other questions?

No, I just want to echo, I had the opportunity to be out there with them in late January at two different meetings.

They've been really responsive to the community.

CTP board member Ray Smoot, some of you may know him, he sees, gosh, you walk into a restaurant with him, everyone knows him.

He said the VPRA team for being out there so often.

They're so awesome.

And it's one VPRA.

We don't really care if they report to Jericho or me or the engineering team, FIE and others.

It's really a great group.

And to see them coalesce in jail and take the trips out there, it's been great to see.

And the community feels that as well.

They feel that earnestness from them.

Thank you.

I just wanted to reiterate the things that's been shared around the table.

Participating remotely, I hate I'm not there, but I do want to thank not only the staff and the board here who are working to recognize the value,

of this additional mode of transportation for all Virginians and a lot of work been done that I think is turning out some very positive results but also want to thank our partners at the New River Valley there in the authority that they have or the advocacy group they have established there in Radford-Christiansburg region

and just wanted to say that that was well done.

All the work they've done up to this point and the combination of the partnership between everyone has really created some successful paths forward.

Thank you.

Any more comments?

Just close by saying what an incredible job the BKRA team has done in this economic background.

So with that, we are going to take a break.

Jackson, are we on mute now?

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Just a couple of items before I dive into the presentation.

I guess first, just heard about exploring the option of the Christiansburg Extension

In this budget, we're still maintaining the Cinnabar site as far as the budget until we get to that feasibility of both the design and the financial perspective on that alternative.

Second, I want to reiterate that the budget development really is a continuous process.

We look at all the sources of funding, all the uses of funding.

It's really a holistic approach that we both look at our capital spending and our operations spending.

The mantra is when we get done with all these big capital projects, we've got to be able to afford to operate the trains at that point.

It also takes a look at the entire life

So with that, I will jump into the slides that we have.

And if you recall here last May, we had a funding shortfall

As we now move forward past 30%, we also

and more came to the conclusion we need to have a second point where we change those baselines.

And that is when we get a final construction bid.

That's when we will come to you and say we're going to adjust the budget, ask for the approval, and adjust the schedule.

That's not to say that I think we had some discussion about projects that is constantly looking at budget and schedule.

I think you've heard that throughout a lot of different people's discussions.

So next, this is the high level basically last year, last May compared to where we are today.

And what you see at the top on this is you see that unfunded of $705 million on the required projects.

So last year we had a budget where we had the required projects and Long Bridge in the largest one where we had a significant unfunded balance.

and our plans to go to the federal government.

We did that.

We got $129 million of funding.

I think it was November 9th, if I recall correctly.

So last year we had that issue.

We solved it.

And now we're looking at May of this year and we're actually in balance where all the required projects are funded and we have a management reserve of $150 million.

So you see, we did

Sources of $1.24 million.

We had about the same amount of uses, which is the biggest part of that.

There's two real big parts to it.

The unfunded balance, and then we added $200 million to the V-line or the Cinebar transaction back in January.

And one more thing, I didn't say feel free at any time to ask questions.

We don't have any formula.

Yeah, okay, yeah.

That uses is all of the capital

capital project cost and all the operational costs from 21 all the way to 30.

And the only exception to that is we do eliminate when a project is completed, so it's done and we pay for it.

So how does it work in government accounting?

So we work on an enterprise fund basis.

So it's full accrual.

Next slide.

So that was sort of an overview of the budget last year compared to this year out of a macro bubble looking at the financial planning.

This next slide is just looking at what we briefed you from January of 25 when we did a briefing on the budget from May to then, the changes that occurred in that time.

And what you see is we've had a reduction in some of the sources of funding.

and some of the uses of the funding.

And the net of that was we can add $20 million more to our management.

So the next few slides will give you more detail as far as what the $70 million and $90 million are.

So that's $70 million.

The biggest part was operational revenues.

So our Northeast Corridor share, so our revenues from

with Amtrak, and the northeast quarter portion has lagged.

And based on where that is, we've pushed that projection through.

So that's the adjustment, that's $7,800 million.

I will say we've been working with Amtrak.

Their team's been very receptive.

I think we had a twice a month call with them and talk about fares and looking at the analysis of where things were trending.

They've been very receptive.

I think it was about two months ago, they actually adjusted the Northeast Corridor side of the fare charts that we knew.

I want to publicly thank Ray Lang and his team for going with us on this.

They're very receptive.

Steve, can I ask a question on that?

Is Jeremy going to cover that again?

Because I know early on the slide that we had

Rioship of 11% fares are flagged.

I don't know if Jeremy's here.

So I would say this, we could probably do the more in-depth presentation.

You know, maybe the next board meeting we could get into that.

Like I said, we have these biweekly meetings, Amtrak, and maybe we could share more detail there.

And I don't know if you all recall, but I think it was in November we came through and we talked to you a little bit about there were going to be a fare decrease.

Because I think when we saw this analysis, we discovered that fares had not changed.

I think it was either 2018 or 2019 that fares had not been adjusted.

So we chose to say, let's do that fare decrease in the two-step process.

We implemented the first step.

We have not implemented the second step.

So maybe that's where we go next.

What we saw from that was we were changing the introversion and then actually brought in more revenue.

The ridership is showing it didn't really seem to have a negative impact on ridership.

And I said Amtrak has increased their

So the top part, that was the main item, was the 79 from the operations revenue slight adjustment to our long-term dedicated tax revenue to come up rail fund revenues.

The bottom part of this slide is basically taking the sources and just showing you over quarterly basis how they are changing.

I think you can see there's always, there's positive movement and there's negative movement going on in that planning process.

And then finally the last part of this is the management reserve and once again taking through changes.

Y'all have accrued the $124 million in each quarter, you've accrued the $270 million and then you've accrued the $130 million.

So this next slide, what we did here, these are very similar to what we showed you in January.

Don't expect you to remember all that, but hopefully you can see the color shaded in sort of a reddish-orangish color.

Those are the items that have changed, and this is where we're drilling down to show you that change of what was $90 million in uses.

So we did have,

This top line, the I-95 border, about a $41 million change there.

And then in the operations side, we had some changes.

The biggest operational change between January and today is the new methodology for PREA-209 and how false they're allocated.

That actually, to all the states that have intrastate passenger or long distance passenger service,

That actually had fine lines, and we got the projections, and it was significantly positive for Virginia.

Actually, there's going to be lower costs going forward, which helped offset some of the false revenue I was talking about in any city.

The next couple of slides go into more detail.

So here's that increase of $41 million to a project was the handover

in advance to 30% design, and the current budget is $41 million additional as of that 30%.

Additionally, down here at the very bottom, there's $3 million of transaction costs related to the I-95 corridor.

We're still doing a lot of work on the right-of-way survey of the actual

So going now over to the operation side, back in January on the operation side, really just a real high level of what we included in the planning process, but as far as actually presenting a budget, you're not required to present an operational budget per se for CTB approval.

So we just did a real high level estimate of an operational budget.

So there's gonna be a little bit more detail here

today on the operations side.

This shows the operations through 2031 and the biggest changes from last year to this year.

Last year, the planning window I spoke of earlier went through 2030.

This year, the capital projects, the end dates pushed a little into 2031.

So to look at that holistically, like I said earlier, we needed to

In this case, this is showing that extra year, you see the $276 million, and then you see changes to the basis.

We recently, this has not been signed, but it is at Federal Railroad Administration on their desk to be signed, but it recently got approval from the FRA

And before I go any further, I want to say included within the capital projects, these costs have always been included.

So the cost of managing the project, the cost of Mike McLaughlin, some of my costs, that's what we're talking about.

They've always been in these budgets.

So it's not adding anything to the budget, it's merely the classification.

within this document.

So instead of it being called administrative, we're now coming up with a basis and a percentage of all the overhead costs to be able to allocate that out to all the capital projects, as well as the Amtrak operations.

So we get to a true cost of the project and a true cost of our Amtrak operations.

So that's why you see such a large change there, that over

A 10-year window of administrative costs going down is now a lot of that's been allocated at the time.

Once again, looking at it from just a one-year interest, that's what's next.

Taking it from last year to this year, and once again, point out the change down here at the very bottom of the operations administration budget, see that significant change because of the cost allocation plan,

In the middle, you see a reduction in the actual train operations expense, which is what I referenced earlier, the new 3 and 2 and on methodology that actually benefited us.

And then the third item I want to point out here is the total operating revenues.

It does show an increase.

See the NEC is flat, but the intro Virginia, which is a very top line train revenue, we

with those revenues.

This next slide takes our administrative budget and breaks it down in a lot more detail.

Two main points here.

Two main points.

First off is the maintenance changes.

So professional services, we do have an increase.

A big part of that is in the coming year, we're going to be pushing forward with two of our

Debt financing initiatives.

So first, with the I-66 inside of the Beltway Initiative, working with VDOT and that, there's going to be some costs with doing some revenue studies and also with financial advisors.

And then second, and this is going positive too, is pushing forward with the debt related to the Amtrak ticket revenue.

So it took a while working with Amtrak,

The funding got now approval for those 10 passage of ticket revenues to actually be sent to us directly, well, through them, but in a gross dollar amount, whereas before they were always netted against the cost.

And so essentially we received no funding, so there was a subsidized service there.

And what that allows us to do is that stream of funding so that the prior slide had $86 million revenue

This is just the first year we agreed to do it, so we've got to get through this year, make sure operationally the two teams work well, and then maybe we can work towards having a longer agreement.

In addition to that, we have to start work through

about this professional services.

Those two items, big two items about professional services.

Information technology is up.

We're, you know, last year we implemented financial ERP.

In the current year, we did the acquisition, the procurement of our project management information system.

In the coming years, I think right around now, we're beginning early stages of that implementation.

And then on top of that, Jeremy and his team are working on an enterprise asset management system.

As TJ said earlier, all the different rail lines we own, we own a lot of different lines and a lot of different assets.

Eventually, we're going to be more responsible to contract that out versus just Sandbox, CSX, you maintain.

So knowing what we have and what's the life of it.

So those two systems plus

The financial ERP still has an underlying annual cost, so that's why the information technology is up.

The other item I just want to point out, other employee costs are down, and that's really just matching that to what we've seen in the history perspective.

It's been over-budgeted in the past few years.

Funds weren't being utilized, so we have a better perspective on what we're thinking.

The other main point before I walk

to move along is the cost allocation plan.

That's what these last two columns are on this table.

It's showing the breakout to either the Amtrak operations or the Capital Project Administration.

So it's taking this total, I call it overhead, and saying how it's allocated.

This is what we added last May, and I think it was really the slide

Just sort of gives y'all an idea of where our thinking is in that planning process as far as risk.

You see here the I-66 on financing, and the reason I have that as high is we started receiving some pay-go funding from that stream.

to give it to us by VDOT lowered that amount of pay go funding.

And that had me somewhat concerned because our thought had been the longer we can delay that financing, the more the traffic will return to the I-66 corridor.

And the more the traffic returns, then more toll revenues and the more we can finance.

So I'll say this, I am not overly worried

We are doing a study with VDOT right now that by the end of August we should have a tier one total revenue study completed, which actually I hope delayed my concern that today I have it as high and hopefully we can move this to a moderate rate.

Second item, I already talked about Amtrak revenue financing, that financing we do have

So really big deal to be able to get through that Amtrak, start receiving those funds and there's still, that's like the first step of maybe five major steps.

So still a little bit of concern where we get through all those steps.

And finally, the last slide I have is on our management reserve.

This is by the board about the policy each quarter.

We need to ask for your approval.

So this will be through March 31st of 2024.

And as showed you earlier how we built up to this $150 million amount.

I'll add it's not on the slide.

Per the policy, y'all's goal is 5% of that capital

That's the goal they all set out and that 5% equates to $284 million as of March 31st.

So we will have a $150 million reserve balance.

The goal was listed as in the policy as up to 5%.

So I think I feel like we're in a good place there also.

With that, I entertain questions.

So we've got two actions.

I'll take the budget first.

The resolution for you is to approve the VPRA fiscal year 25 budget.

Hello, Ms. Doersch, seconded by Ms. Bulova.

Regarding your projection for intra-MTRAC, did I read this correctly?

I think you said it.

And that's over the budget from last year.

OK.

So you feel confident with that?

Yes.

I-66 inside the Beltway, total revenue.

There's a memorandum of agreement that... We're on our third iteration of that, but it's a relationship between VDOT, DRPT, and Northern Virginia Transportation Commission.

So how does that look then?

Does DRPT, you mentioned that, does the

So the first call for funding is to take care of the operations and maintenance of the facility.

Okay.

If I may not.

Then there's a commitment that there's an allocation that goes to the NDTC for their commuter choice program.

It's spelled out with an amortization schedule and started at 10 millions for two and a half percent a year.

They get their piece.

And then if once that is funded, then

The next piece goes towards crossings of the Potomac, which would be Long Bridge and any future projects related to the Roslyn Tunnel Veteran System.

And then my third question, you mentioned formula money from Virginia soon, for rail.

For rail, yes.

So what's the,

All of the revenues that go into transportation as a whole, gas tax, insurance premiums, everything goes into one big fund now that's divided up by mode.

And that, one of the big changes to the code, not only did VPRA get established in 2020, but really consolidated all of those revenue sources into one fund, leveled out the ups and downs from the different revenue sources, because as the economy kind of comes and goes, some

The old formula had certain revenues going to transit, and certain revenues going to rail, and certain revenues going to highway, and sometimes the highway side got more and the transit side got less.

So the federal side, formula money, the 20% that goes to the state, that goes to DRPT,

The first of that goes to NBCC, correct?

DRPT still has that.

responsibility, correct?

Are we talking about 66?

Because there's no- No, no, 66.

Yes, there's nothing transit related to- No, exactly, exactly.

So the rural human service goes to DRPT.

I think some of that

Not through us.

They get there through PRTC.

It's direct for SIPC.

Correct.

So that does not come through.

All the urban funds direct for SIPC.

Yeah, it's a split between us, LOMA, and marketerings.

That's ours.

Oh, so not NVCC.

They don't get any, they don't have any funding.

There's state money that comes from DRPT to NVTC to BRE.

I gotcha.

Interesting.

Jennifer, you did an excellent job at that.

Well, and just one last little tidbit, the Commonwealth Rail Fund money we get in our establishing language for the authority, it prohibits us from issuing debt against that.

So that's why we're going looking at these

And I think it's all about the debt capacity of the Commonwealth.

One of the little provisions that 2020 session.

And I have to say, I think you're saying this, I think it's great because we used to have a rail fund that was dedicated

Repardation tax.

So the housing market was going great.

We might be doing fine, but the housing market wasn't doing well.

All of a sudden, rail was suffering.

And now, all of those shared those ups.

And at the risk of, I would say this, and then I'll say I'm going to complicate things.

There's also toll revenues that come out of 66 outside the Beltway and out of the 95.

The ones of 195 go to NVTC.

BRE's been the beneficiary of some of that funding.

The toll revenues that are dedicated to transit from 66 outside the Beltway come to DRPT and that those projects are funded to DRPT six-year programs.

BRE's also been the beneficiary of that.

So there's, I mean, there's all of those toll projects have a transit component that can benefit, in particular, BRE, but the rail infrastructure here

Thanks for pointing that out.

66 outside is still very early on.

We're just getting to the point where we're starting to see some of that.

I think that's it.

All right, any other questions?

Great.

Murphy Lee Wolfmeyer.

That was a discussion.

That was a nice discussion.

Ms. Bulova?

Aye.

Ms. Moosche?

Aye.

Ms. Doersch?

Aye.

Ms. Drake?

Aye.

Ms. Moses-Nedd?

Aye.

Second question carries.

Next action is approval of the Management Reserve balance to the quarter.

Motion for approval.

Second.

Motion by Ms. Doersch, second by Ms. Bulova.

Hearing none, Mary Stell, could you follow Ms. Bulova?

Ms. Loeschke?

Aye.

Mr. Cardwell?

Aye.

Ms. Doersch?

Aye.

Ms. Drake?

Aye.

Ms. Moses-Nedd?

Aye.

Aye.

Mr. Watkins?

Mr.

Good afternoon, Madam Chair, Executive Director, Board, and attendees.

We're pleased to present again on Long Bridge Progress.

It's an honor to do this.

We've had some activities since our last updates and certainly wanted to give those updates to the Board, keep everybody and the public as well for the practice of our activities.

We are under an active procurement, so we'll have to

I'll maintain some of the confidentiality of the contents.

However, we will tell them.

Orient ourselves again, Long Bridge Project Quares.

So if you look at the map all the way to the left of the page, the orange segment represents Long Bridge in its entirety.

and to the north of Long Bridge project where the tracks, you see the tracks split and the verge that goes to Union Station of course continues along the CSX line.

There's the Long Front project which is the project for the VTRA TRV program that's in the extreme north.

The insect that you see here represents the entirety of the Long Bridge project, roughly 1.8 miles.

And of course, the noteworthy thing is we're still representing the information that we know to date and we're preserving that the Long Bridge, as far as we know, is on target for 2013.

To focus on Long Bridge South package itself, so South package is the extreme southern end

and then it's pretty much bookended at both ends by parks.

So you have the Long Bridge Park to the left of the page of the world, which is really south, and to the north of the page you see the East Potomac Park bookending Long Bridge project, South project, which is roughly 0.6 miles and actually paused when I went and looked at the numbers and I was like 0.6 miles.

How do I visualize that?

So I thought of a football field.

M-Zone to M-Zone, 360 feet, it's about 9 foot tall if you install.

And the scope of work for the Long Bridge sub-package encompasses two bridge structures.

One, a double track rail structure and adjacent to that, a pedestrian bike bridge, which will be owned by DDOT.

So I didn't want to read the fine print, but that's in essence what it says.

Can I just ask you one quick question?

Did you say the pedestrian bridge is owned by DDOT?

It will be.

As of now.

Thank you, Brian, for that overview.

I did mention at the beginning, we are an inactive RFP.

So we're just going to give high-level overviews.

We're excited to work this procurement and look towards wrapping up it into the year.

That's what some of these next slides are going to be about.

But we did just want to bring it back to the board because this project will need board approval.

So we thought it would just be a good time to tee it up on where we've been and where we're going to go for the rest of the year.

As a reminder, we're doing this as a two-step RFP to bring on a design builder.

And this design builder and this RFP will determine a design builder that best meets our criteria that we set in the RFP and submits the best proposal and offers the best value to VPRA.

Now, we've decided to do this project as a design build, and we wanted to put in bold here some of the activities that have been part of the RFP.

You know, a lot of people in design build

brings collaboration to the table and it helps get you a better project at the end of it.

So we did just want to highlight that as part of the RFP, we've been having stakeholder communications, utility forums, site tours, ATCs, preliminary ATCs, final ATCs, one-on-one meetings, scope validation plans.

There's just been a lot of collaboration and activity with all the firms that were shortlisted.

So we just wanted to highlight the activities that's going on that is setting us up for the final stages of this RFP.

All the firms that are shortlisted are going to submit their technical proposals at the end of this summer, at the end of August 23rd that we're scheduled to receive the technical proposals.

At that point, VPRA is going to review and score the technical proposal to find a design builder that offers the best plans towards us.

Now, we did just always work highlighting the technical proposals are due in August,

The price proposals are due in October, and we have that on the screen here.

So John and I talked, and I was glad for the question.

As long as we didn't be teasing, so we wanted to pause and drop in all of those acronyms and whatnot, to just look at design build.

Why did we go design build?

So to John's point,

fostering collaboration, really collaboration between the contractor and the owner ourselves.

So we will have a direct contract with the contractor, where the contractor entity is a designer and a builder who can concurrently, side-by-side, typically in joint ventures to do the project.

So we have those early points of input.

And as John described, he put that bold environment prior slide to demonstrate that

are under this procurement umbrella.

It's not as if we're inactive.

There's a lot of activity going on.

It's a lot of complex things, both on the internal VPRA team side, as well as the contractor side, as we continue to look for best value out of the engagement.

So we shortlisted, when we spoke last time in December, shortlisted our vendors, and we've been going through none of them.

Where we took the design that we had developed coming out of preliminary engineering, we landed at a 30% level of design.

Because the self-package had, and again we did risk analyses, the self-package had less, I guess, high level of certainty and very critical level risks.

If I can, real quick, your point about the last risk in the South.

Yesterday, a lot of you went out for a tour, and you were able to see where an old bridge

Crossover Body of Water right south of the Salamander Hotel.

We're going to build a new bridge there, stage it, take the current one out of service, build another bridge, you know, build a four-track bridge there.

Whereas Long Bridge South, as you saw, we're building the new bridge next to the current bridge that's staying in service.

So that goes to that risk that Biden's talking about, a lot less risk on the South package, and hence why the North package needed

and clicking across the line.

Now, please take it that you all were able to see my project, right?

I think if anyone stood between the existing CSX bridges and the Wal-Mata Bridge, it's less risky, it doesn't seem as easy.

It's still complex because when you're standing, you get a perspective from the massive structures that we're going to build, and it isn't a long space.

So Michael, I'm getting confused.

I know it's easy for me to get confused.

And that's already going to border to Skanska?

Skanska, Flatirons, Long Bridge north, which was our last stop.

That's Long Bridge North.

That didn't work.

That needed to go first because it was more complex.

Yeah, which you want, because I'm getting to know you.

You can sit right where we stood.

So then you'd be on this side, looking at the Washington Channel.

And so you're bookended kind of like by the Washington Channel, like in that cluster, but this is farther north.

And so this is about from six miles

This is Longbridge North, but it's not.

It's that little piece is north, and that's a front scan instead of a flatliner.

So let me just put you, once in doubt, yesterday we had three stops.

One was at the Longbridge Aquatic Center, which that was five.

So we stood there, we moved northward, and that is the beginning, that's the southernmost end of the South Pack.

Our second stop was right on the other side of the river facing south.

So right there, right.

And then we look south and we look at the area between the two bridges and we saw that all is the south package as well.

Right.

And then when we turned around the other way, we didn't really talk about it, but that's really the beginning of the north package.

So then our third stop was right by the marina where we actually saw some of the early work stuff at the National Park

That's where we looked to our left, and then in front of us by the hotel, where that bridge is going to be added, that's the morning package.

Ice therapy slides all day.

I just thought it was worthwhile just to remind y'all, there's obviously been a lot of planning coordination with stakeholders on the Long Bridge project as an entirety and the Long Bridge South.

That's been in progress for the past several years.

Like I had said, we've been getting up to 30%.

There's been a lot of just utility tests going on out there, stakeholder coordination.

Just thought it was worth mentioning the progress that got us to where we are right now in this RFP.

We also did bring on, in 2023, the project maintenance support services with Long Bridge Partners.

And y'all approved that contract as well.

So they've been brought on to help us with Long Bridge.

And so it was worth mentioning, too, what got us here.

We did do a two-step procurement.

And the first step was request for qualifications.

We did shortlist all the qualifications.

And we asked firms and the SOQ, RFQ allowed firms to demonstrate their ability

and qualifications to undertake the design and construction of the Long Bridge.

So we were looking at their quals before we showed this to the berms that are now part of the RFP.

All this is leaving us up to when we get the technical proposals, when we get the price proposals, VPRA is going to select a design building that brings the best value to this project.

When we do, we're going to need board approval.

Now, we did want to put an asterisk.

We're assuming that we'll have this done and have a notice of intent and work on negotiations for an agreement.

to have to go in December ahead of the January board meeting when we would be asking for a potential vote.

We may call a special board meeting to try to advance it.

Yeah, if there's ever, we talked about this last year, if things go quicker, we can brief you in November and go to execution December, we'll do that.

The team is a busy team and they do need some time and review will go through it.

But so these are,

and finally at least slide.

John Beck, I'd like to your point.

So the other thing that we're doing to this, we're not, we haven't lost sight of that package, both package and the sub-package, although they're disparate packages.

It's one long bridge, you know?

So we're actually ensuring that the piece of which we're going to move through the procurement cycle

It makes sense with how we're coordinating them and continuing to de-risk things.

So in part of the tail end, where we have some ambiguity with the base, we're going to get into various negotiations to conquer our paper.

We will speed that in, just as always, to try to get us to the engagements.

Next steps, just as a recap, it's going to be a busy summer for VPRA and our design builders that are shortlisted.

As we work towards receiving their technical proposals and their price proposals, there's going to be a lot of juggling going on to give us to those proposals coming in later this summer and early fall.

And then we are optimistic that at the end of the year or by the before the January board meeting,

seeking board approval before we execute any contract.

And that would be the score to substantial completion in 2030.

So this slide looks very easy.

It's not going to be easy.

It's going to be an exciting, busy summer in bulk.

We will need board approval.

And obviously, there's a lot of stuff that happens for that last

We talked a lot with New River Valley about the importance of engaging stakeholders and I want to give these guys another round of kudos for the engagement that they've done with the industry.

We often forget because we're living in this space that four years ago this entity didn't exist and now they're delivering mega projects and it takes

A lot of very deliberate, diligent work with the industry to socialize them to who we are, to say what we're going to do, to live up to those commitments we make for dates when things are going to go out on the street.

And this team has built that confidence with the industry.

I heard it a lot that, you know, there were people that saw this as, I mean, these are big projects as press, but because these guys lay out very openly,

What they're going to do, when they're going to do it, they follow through with what they say.

It's made this whole process feel a lot better.

So it's a strong partnership with the industry that they've had countless industry days.

I know DJ is always the one who's talking to the Virginia Transportation Construction Alliance.

Mike has done that.

So thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

All right, no more presentation left.

The last that never, never leaves is our chairman, Abby.

All right, good afternoon.

I'm going to start with the performance part of this, talk about the Passenger Rail Investment Improvement Act of 2008.

I have talked about this a little bit in another presentation, but anything Section 209 is what we say a lot, but that is the agreement that Virginia Passenger Rail Authority has with Amtrak that authorizes

Services, the four routes that we sponsor in Virginia.

So looking at the entire network where there are Amtrak trains running throughout, the light blue lines down here in the south, the 209 agreement, that's how we make it possible to run services to Virginia on those lines.

We're kind of zooming into the Virginia section there.

This is just a review of the kind of the trains that we're monitoring in our performance analysis.

The Navy Blue trains are the trains that Virginia sponsors.

So we have the two daily round trips to Rona, we have two daily round trips to Newport News, the three daily round trips to Norfolk, and there is one daily round trip out of Richmond Main Street Station as well.

We also have the Carolinian, which is sponsored by North Carolina, and then we have Long Distance Services, the Cardinal, in the very far western part of the state,

It's three days a week.

We also have the Crescent Service, which actually goes down to New Orleans, and that's a daily train.

The Auto Train, which comes out of Lorton, Virginia, and shoots straight down to Florida.

And then we have the Silver Star, the Palmetto, and the Silver Meteor, which are long-distance services.

They're not sponsored by Virginia, but they are very important to our service because they offer other services that a lot of Virginians book when you're booking from the track.com, you don't usually know if it's Virginia State Support or it's long-distance.

It's important for service performance.

It took effect on October 1, 2013 for routes that are less than 750 miles that are operated at the request of the states.

And it allows us to work with Amtrak on defining the cost-sharing methodology between Amtrak and Virginia.

And so looking at Staples Mill Station, for example, where you saw there were both long-distance services stay supported in the Carolinian.

In the Staples Mill Station scenario, we don't pay for the entirety of the station.

In Norfolk, for example, that is exclusively those three daily round trips are explicitly state supported trains and we do pay 100% of the maintenance staff costs at normal.

All that cost sharing comes out of the 200 agreement.

It also establishes certain rates like labor rates.

So if we increase staff at a station, we'll have some predictability about how much it costs.

And then it also defines things like the G&A rates that we pay a share of because they're corporate expenses that states share with Amtrak.

And as I mentioned earlier, so the Amtrak owns the fleet, so it's a little bit like a rental car fleet, right, that we pay a usage rate of the fleet that circulates throughout the system.

We don't own the equipment in Virginia.

It gives us that one-seat ride into the Northeast Corridor.

The 209 agreement also allows us certain rights with our services, so we work with the revenue management team, we set the fares in Virginia, that's something that Steve's team has been working with us on

And we also adjust schedules and can change the overall service levels, which is something that we did during COVID.

And then we have Amtrak quarterly meetings, which are part of those agreements.

And that's where we address things with the executive levels at Amtrak on on-time performance, customer service, or other high priorities.

And our quarterly meeting is tomorrow.

One other thing about 209, it allows us to work with Amtrak and the other states collectively, because it's something that Congress kind of gave us that charge to do.

And so Congress actually funds a team that supports what we call a safer seat, the State Amtrak Inner City Passenger Rail Committee.

We have a meeting later this month in Chicago.

We work on improving the transparency of the costs that are shared with us through Amtrak.

We also negotiate various aspects of the methodology.

We've been updating that for years now.

And there are also service enhancement initiatives that we work on collectively with Amtrak, such

Right now, we're working on a pilot to localize food and beverage options on our services.

So we actually have a kickoff this Saturday for a company out of Ashland.

So now we'll jump into the performance side, and I'm going to start with the DRB.

Mr. Delton, do you want to say anything before I jump into the details here?

Jump into the details.

I'll just say right on the onset, this is less than desirable.

So, and it's not just VRE that's struggling, Amtrak is also struggling out there on the section of track between Washington and Richmond.

So, in April of this year, at a VRE service, which is the on-time performance defined as that last scheduled stop within six minutes of the scheduled arrival time, at 75.9% of the time arriving on time.

So looking over here down in the lower right-hand corner of the trains by numbers, blue being on the Manassas line, red being on the Fredericksburg line, a lot of these are those earlier or later trains when some congestion has let up or hasn't started yet in the day and a lot of the worst performing trains are the ones that held up in the congestion in that mid-day timeframe.

I would say 3.29, we talked about that briefly as we come in, really that one isn't quite as bad in most

and other registers on time.

Any further comments?

I'll let you know.

All right, moving down to the state-supported services, the ones that we sponsor, the Northeast Regional Center extended into Virginia, we were at about 60% in April of this past year.

So we are also not doing a spectacular, the goal was 80%.

If you look down here on the right,

Our best performing trains are also typically the morning or the evening trains.

And then we also have our afternoon trains get caught up in congestion.

That seems to be the theme there.

And you can see we were holding in the beginning of the year around 12,000 minutes, but we spied up to people.

And we have some consistency in the issues that we're seeing.

I'm going to go over those, but I just want to stop here and do questions on overall on-time performance for Virginia service.

Long distance service.

Long distance has longer travel, therefore they have more opportunities for the service to degrade on the way.

So we usually see lower on-time performance with these services.

These are the ones in orange.

So we had about 38, 39% on-time all-station on-time performance in April for the trains that are coming up from Florida.

They struggle especially because they have that longer

on their way into Virginia.

And then we also have some trains coming out of Washington that struggle as well.

So overall, long distance is our worst performing, and that, of course, affects the appearance that customers experience regardless of constraints.

So these are the major themes that we're tracking right now for the service performance committees.

And I'm going to go over each one

But at a high level, CSX has a key order policy.

Every row has to have a key order policy.

CSX is very conservative, but we're trying to adjust for that.

We've talked about it for years.

VRB has adjusted schedules in summertime, previous to this summer, but this is the first time that we're doing it for the Virginia State Supported Service.

So as a Memorial Day, we have a schedule in place that lasts until September, Labor Day.

And that aligns with the artery.

So we had to slow things down just a little bit to anticipate frequent key orders.

And there are key orders out there today.

Washington Union Station.

The latest persists that are actually getting a little worse.

We'll talk about that.

This continues to be struggles in Washington Union Station getting trains and southbound trains into Virginia on time.

We have seen a spike in freight train adherence, particularly between Richmond and Fredericksburg.

We are going to do more analysis on that.

That spike came before the Maryland Bridge collapse.

It's not necessarily because of more freight coming through Virginia.

There is more freight coming through Virginia right now.

And then slow orders.

Slow orders happen when we have construction projects out there and if you have some work going on to slow the trains down, if they go through the area or in the finished work and things are still settling.