Long Bridge Project Virtual Public Meeting - June 22, 2022   6/22/2022

Hello.

Welcome to the Long Bridge public meeting.

It's June 22nd.

We are going to take you through the current status of the Long Bridge project for about an hour here.

So with that, we'll start.

I'm Katherine Youngbluth, the Director of Planning at Virginia Passenger Rail Authority.

Next slide.

What is Virginia Passenger Rail Authority?

Well, Virginia Passenger Rail Authority has taken on the duties of the Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation.

We are a newly formed organization by the General Assembly in 2020.

The General Assembly gave us all powers having to do with delivering the host of rail projects that you see on the right side of the screen.

Those hosts of projects are known as transforming rail in Virginia and they're phased improvements to expand the capacity and deliver passenger service with the delivery of capital improvements.

along the existing rail track from Richmond to Washington, DC.

The Transforming Rail in Virginia projects include Long Bridge, which we're here to talk about tonight, and Virginia Passenger Rail Authority,

is in partnership with CSX to deliver the capital improvements.

In 2019, the Governor of Virginia announced a landmark deal to purchase half the CSX right-of-way throughout Virginia.

and that includes Washington DC to North Carolina and various areas around the Commonwealth.

The lower left network map illustrates the purchase areas between CSX and the Commonwealth of Virginia.

VPRA was to administrate the capital improvements I just discussed.

VPRA was given all powers necessary to do so.

And this pertains to the Commonwealth.

We are able to design, build, and finance rail facilities.

We are a direct recipient of USDOT grants.

We have eminent domain powers in Virginia.

We have our own board separate to the Commonwealth Transportation Board.

We report directly to the new board, the Virginia Passenger Rail Authority Board.

It's a 15-member board with governor appointees, and they have a rotating term for each member.

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I wanted to focus back on the Long Bridge Project.

This is the Long Bridge Project corridor.

For those of you who are familiar with it, it is in between Virginia and the District of Columbia.

Upper left map shows the project location within the District of Columbia and Virginia along the Potomac River.

The right location shows where we span.

So the project location spans from Arlington, Virginia into the District of Columbia, ending just shy of the Lafont Plaza area and that VRE station at a location known as LE Interlocking.

On the bottom side of this slide, you can see the complexity of the project.

Spanning from Arlington on the left side at RO Interlocking, the project spans

Arlington County property, NPS property at George Washington Memorial Parkway, the Potomac River, East-West Potomac Park in the district, and Washington Channel in the district, and then the Southwest urban area ending again at the Elliott Interlocking just shy of Lafont Plaza.

Within the corridor, there are a complexity of

New bridges that you see illustrated here and new retaining walls to support a four track corridor, expanding, doubling the rail capacity within the rail corridor that's existing and in planning improvements.

within NPS property for a separated passenger, primarily passenger rail to track corridor just north of the existing CSX corridor from East West Potomac Park into Arlington.

We'll talk more about that momentarily.

There are four main areas as I just discussed in mass.

In this slide, they're illustrated by a number.

So we think of the project areas in these terms and we'll discuss them as such throughout the presentation.

George Washington Memorial Parkway is labeled as number one, so GW Parkway.

We have some bridges over there.

leading into area number two, Potomac River, where we'll add two new bridges over the Potomac River into East-West Potomac Park.

Those two bridges will be the rail bridge with the new two-track rail bridge, and in addition, the fourth mitigation of the bike pad bridge.

They'll be north of the existing CSX-owned Long Bridge.

CSX will continue to own Long Bridge.

That is existing 1904 bridge.

and to the north of the area where the new two bridges are planned is the Metro Yellow Line Bridge.

As we go to East West Potomac Park, that's labeled area number three, we have a complexity of highways and parkland to traverse as we move to section number four, which is the Main Avenue Southwest area.

where we navigate not just the highway ramps going to and from 14th Street Bridge to also to 395, 695 area, but is the urban context of private property ownership and the Washington Marina there.

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We'll pause shortly, quickly to show you a quick video of the proposed corridor and a flyover.

As we pull this up, we've provided this animation to best illustrate what the proposed project may look like in the future.

As we see here, we're flying over Virginia Long Bridge Aquatic Centers to your left as we approach the new two-track bridge just north of the existing Long Bridge to the bottom of your screen.

You can also see the proposed ped bridge, ped bike bridge over the Potomac River.

which connects you directly to Long Bridge Aquatic Center that we just left.

As we traverse over the Potomac River, you can see that the new track, two-track bridge, rail bridge, and the head bike bridge are actually taller than the existing Long Bridge, which is the controlling height structure of the navigable channel over the Potomac River.

It's the lowest bridge, Long Bridge is.

As we go onto East-West Potomac Park,

We can see the National Parks headquarters here, the relationship of the existing buildings and structures to the Long Bridge corridor.

The Long Bridge rail track will span not just 395, but also the metro yellow line tunnel here.

And along this area is where the two tracks meet the existing four tracks and we become a four track rail corridor.

This is a close-up of the new relationship of the new rail bridge to the old.

So you can see that they're still separated from each other at this point.

Moving back towards Main Avenue and the Washington Channel, we're still over East West Potomac Park, flying over what we call Ohio Drive East, where there will be a new bridge replacing the existing rail bridge over Ohio Drive East and the East West Potomac Park area.

In addition, we'll replace the Washington Channel Bridge and the Main Avenue Bridge.

This is another detail of the replaced Ohio Drive Bridge along with the Washington Channel Bridge at the four tracks.

Moving along into the Main Avenue area, you'll see that the existing privately owned Main Avenue Ped Bridge will be relocated and there will be a ADA

ramp that will be constructed to serve Main Avenue from that bridge.

The existing rail bridge is also replaced.

Moving back towards Virginia, we can see the 395 crossing again, the relationship of the complexity of the highway here, as well as the metro tunnel.

You'll see here that the Ped Bridge ends in the district at that location on East West Potomac Park.

And we're flying back towards Long Bridge Aquatic Center.

You can see that the bike connection serves both Mount Vernon Trail here and continues along to Long Bridge Park Aquatic Center.

As we leave this area, you would note that the complexity of the structures, although both bridge structures over the GW Parkway will be unstructured and not retaining wall.

We'll move on from these slides to go more into the details of each bridge span, and we'll move through the rest of the slideshow here.

As we go to the next slide,

So just to sum up what you just saw, if we're not building a bridge, we're building a retaining wall, and we're building quite a few of each to serve the daily trains that are in operation now.

This is counting of all of the complexity of the project.

I'm not going to read every slide here, but it is important to keep this in mind, the complexity of the project as we move forward.

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Where have we been for the Long Bridge Project?

The Long Bridge Project is over a decade old now, starting in 2011 with DDOT sponsorship.

And DDOT led the pre-NEPA and NEPA phases in strong partnership with Virginia as they move through the EIS stage.

And during the development of the final environmental impact study that ended in 2020, Virginia volunteered to be the project sponsor for the Long Bridge project.

As a result, the Virginia Passenger Rail Authority, VPRA, has taken on a contract to develop the preliminary engineering or PE for the project work that is underway now.

In this PE phase, we intend to do all the things on this slide, and we'll talk more about that in a moment.

But we will also deliver the construction for the project as well.

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There have been many design decisions during the last decade.

This slide illustrates how we got to the design that we're presenting to you today, and all the decisions and public involvement that we had to date.

I'm not going to read again all of the decisions on this slide, but the takeaway from this is that the resulting design that you'll see today had significant public input to relate to the form, the number of bridges, the type of bridges, the number of piers,

what the retaining wall relationship is.

Everything that you have seen has been fully vetted through the community and through the environmental impact statement.

Mitigate and mitigations have been developed to address not just historic issues, but a host of environmental issues that are identified as part of the EIS, final EIS and record of decision section 106 programmatic agreement.

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We're doing a fair amount of the work that you just saw on slide eight today, and many of those tasks that are underway now as part of the engineering design have to do with the technical, bringing our concept design to technical reality in order for the project to be constructible.

You'll see the work that we've completed to date, so a 15% design and then research, technical research that pertains to that design.

And we've gathered stakeholder comments on that 15% design regarding the technical elements that those stakeholders have purview over.

The next steps for us is to continue to public outreach and

and input on the aesthetic design through our statutory requirements, including reviews from the Commission of Fine Arts and the National Capital Planning Commission.

We'll also continue public vetting and engagement with members of the public through meetings such as this and pop-up events.

We have a number of design considerations and refinements to make based on the design decisions that had been made to date.

And you see those listed here on the bottom right of the screen.

Next slide.

With that, I will hand the presentation over to my colleague, Long Bridge Project Manager, Charlene Cleveland.

Thank you, Kate.

Now we're gonna look at some of the look of the proposed Long Bridge Project rail bridges.

Next slide.

So you can see some of these historic pictures.

The one in the top left-hand corner is the old Long Bridge.

It was built in 1904.

This is what it looked like initially.

It was a truss structure painted red.

As you look down on the left-hand side, you can see how it was modified during the Second World War to accommodate heavier vehicles.

So most of the truss was taken away, except for the movable span there that you see in the slide, or the picture.

Currently, the bridge no longer opens.

It is a fixed span, but the bridge is about 18 feet high.

Other pictures you can see is just in East and West Potomac Park, what the rail corridor looked like back there probably in the 1950s, and then what the existing bridge looks like over the GW Parkway.

Next slide.

So here's a concept for how the new rail bridge through the GW Parkway might look.

As Kate mentioned, we are currently coordinating with the Commission of Fine Arts and National Capital Planning Commission as to what the exact final look of these structures will be, but here is a concept that we're working with right now.

This does not show the bicycle pedestrian bridge that will be a part of the project, but just to give you a better view of what the bridge itself would look like.

Next slide.

Here we see the alignments for the two new bridges over the Potomac River.

In the left-hand side, you can see where it connects at the Long Bridge Park over the GW Parkway, extending over the Potomac River, and then aligning into East-West Potomac Park on the right-hand of the screen.

The alignment in white is the proposed rail bridge.

The alignment in green is the proposed pedestrian bridge.

You can see that the piers line up with the existing piers of the Long Bridge.

and that the navigational channel will be the same, lining up for all the four bridges that are right there in the line, the existing Long Bridge, the new Long Bridge, the new Bike Pedestrian Bridge, and the existing Glomonded Yellow Line Bridge.

Very, very tight corridor.

We've got to fit two bridges into a very, very tight spot, but we have looked at it, and constructability-wise, it does seem very possible.

If not, it will be a little challenging to get it all in there.

Next slide.

Here is a visualization of the new rail bridge right adjacent to the existing Long Bridge.

Again, the look of the piers is likely to change a little bit based on our involvement with the Commission of Fine Arts.

Next slide.

Moving on to East and West Potomac Parks, this shows the I-395 rail bridge, which bridges over not only the Wamata Yellow Line portal into the tunnel, but also I-395.

You can see the picture on the right-hand side, historic view of the rail bridge over I-395.

And then looking from the ground, you can see the bridge as it looks today.

Next slide.

and this is what the proposed new rail bridge would look like extending over I-395.

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Moving further to the north and east, you can see that the corridor gets a little more constrained.

We're now we're sharing the CSX right away with the active rail line, which means that the three bridges to the north of here will have to be built in phases so that we can maintain rail traffic as those bridges are being built.

So you can see the existing condition over Ohio Drive East.

The existing rail bridge, they're both from underneath and then looking on in the profile view.

Next slide.

and then you can see what would be proposed for the rebuilt rail bridge carrying both the existing CSX traffic and then the two new tracks, mostly for passenger rail and track and VRE.

Next slide.

And then moving on, again, up through east and west Petromic Parks, moving into the Washington Channel, you can see the existing rail bridge.

Next slide.

And then that would be rebuilt to look like this, again, carrying the four new tracks for both freight and passenger rail.

Next slide.

And then finally, we have Main Avenue Southwest, existing conditions of this rail bridge.

From one side, you can see the rail bridge itself, and then the other side, you have the existing pedestrian bridge connecting up to the Mandarin Hotel Portals area over to the Washington Marina.

Next slide.

And then what is proposed, this shows just the rail bridge itself, again, you know, to the four tracks.

We do not show the pedestrian bridge as we're working out the details of exactly what that bridge would look like with the portals community and the Washington marina.

Next slide.

And generally will look like this that the red would be the corridor for the rail bridge, the rebuilt rail bridge.

Next, we're going to look at the landscaping and retaining walls.

Most of the retaining walls are located in east and west Potomac Parks.

Next slide.

And you can see the retaining walls are to keep the tracks at the appropriate grade.

If it's not, as Kate said, if it's not on a bridge, it's going to be on retaining wall.

And you can see what they look like here with the proposed stone cladding and the broken ashlar.

This itself is at GW Parkway and will approximately match the retaining walls treatments out there.

And with the landscaping plan that you can see to kind of soften

the appearance of the stone in the walls.

Next slide.

Next, we move on to the East and West Potomac Park area.

You can see all the walls and the top and map through the corridor.

Generally, this treatment of the stone cladding, and again, with the landscaping, just often look of the wall.

Lots of walls all through the park with this treatment.

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And now we will talk about the bicycle pedestrian bridge over the Potomac River.

Next slide.

So you can see this whole network here.

The yellow is the proposed connection that we will be building as part of the Long Bridge project.

The green is existing bicycle pedestrian paths in the area.

And then the blue dotted lines are bicycle friendly roads.

So this bridge will provide an important connection and through all of this, providing a direct link from Long Bridge Park and the Mount Vernon Trail over to

East Potomac Park.

And you can see the corridor where we have to build these two bridges.

Again, that is the existing Long Bridge on the left-hand side and the first picture at the top, and then the existing Wamata Yellow Line Bridge on the right-hand side.

We have to fit both, again, the new rail bridge and the bicycle pedestrian bridge in this corridor.

And then the picture at the bottom is the view from the other side of the river from the GW Parkway area looking back across to DC.

Next slide.

And here's some visualizations of what this bridge might look like.

It should be a truss bridge.

This first picture on the left-hand side is its connection down to the Mount Vernon Trail.

And then the picture on the right-hand side is how it will touch down in East Patoma Park.

Next slide.

And just some visualizations of what the experience will be like up on the bridge itself, the pedestrian bridge.

Again, with that truss structure and with a screen for safety so that, you know, small children will not be able to fall off the bridge.

Next slide.

And that's our presentation.

We do encourage you to share your comments, either through the Q&A box, or through our Survey Monkey survey with that link you can see there, which will be active from tonight through July 11 2022.

You can also stay connected via our social media of LinkedIn on Twitter or Facebook.

You can always look at our project information at transformingrailva.com, projects Long Bridge.

Submit comments and questions to transformingrailva.com, get involved contact.

And then sign up for VPRA emails to be notified at future events at passengerrailauthority.org.

And thank you very much.

Great.

Thank you, Kate.

Lee, just before we get to moderation, I just want to remind people very quickly of some ground rules here, perhaps for anyone who joined late.

So please use the Q&A button down below as some of you already have.

Thank you so much for that.

We are with you till eight o'clock tonight.

Rest assured, if we don't get to your question, all questions asked and answered or just asked,

are captured so we will be able to get back to you.

I've also pasted into the chat several other ways you can follow along.

Stay connected to us, social, website, and the like, so please take advantage of those.

This meeting is being recorded, so I just want to let you all know that as well, and it's being livecast right now on YouTube, and there'll also be a recording there on YouTube later.

So with that, I would like to hand it over to Lee, who's now appointing double duty as presenter and now as Q&A moderator.

All right, thank you, Alan.

As I'm like now, I've got so many windows open.

So I've been trying to kind of organize questions as they came in, so it'll probably

be a lot smoother for the questions that were already asked, but please keep throwing things into the chat.

I think I will start with questions about the bike ped bridge, because that is, there are a lot of questions.

I'm here, yeah.

And if you have questions for Fayette or Charlene, feel free to shout them out.

Okay, you're all together.

Okay.

So in terms of the location of the bike pad bridge, Kate, I think there's been a number of questions about opportunities to extend it further into DC.

The physical location of the bridge was determined as part of the EIS.

As you can see through the various presentations, the corridor is very constrained.

Right.

So I think just to clarify that, Kate, and I think that is what you said, right?

Basically, because of the location of the bridge as it crosses the river, there is not space within the railroad corridor to then continue it across the Washington Channel.

So there's another question related to the width of the bridge, and I think there are a couple of questions about that.

The thought process behind the planned width and whether it's accommodating future volumes, understanding that there's

This is a little bit different than a trail and a park, right?

Sure.

So the EIS was led by DDOT, and the planned width of that bridge was agreed to by the DDOT staff at the time.

And the volumes that were collected are all outlined in the EIS as well.

So the form, the width,

is in accordance with the decisions that were made by that group during the EIS timeframe.

Okay, great.

Thanks.

And I'm sorry, I don't have enough hands.

Is it 2,000 feet long?

Roughly 2,600 feet.

Okay.

And then there's another kind of factual question that's just about the existing 14th Street bridge will remain, so the new bridge will be in addition to that.

Okay, moving into questions, some other questions that we had.

Is the question, what is the height?

I believe the new height is

20 feet over the navigable channel.

The controlling bridge structure is the Long Bridge structure itself, which is roughly 18 feet over the navigable channel.

Okay, thank you.

Sorry, I'm apparently missing some of the things I'm supposed to be doing on this thing, but okay.

We cannot predict what the operability of the train during construction is.

We cannot make that call at this time.

We can guarantee that the there will be two tracks operating at all times that was that was agreed to with the operators themselves.

So we will keep those tracks open.

All right, thank you.

And then, I think related to the Ped Bridge over Main Avenue.

And just kind of, I'll read the specific comment.

It's about, you know, kind of the effort to relocate that pedestrian bridge, which is very lightly used today, and won't get much more use in the future.

So it kind of feels like a lot of effort to do that.

And so that's just kind of a comment.

I don't know if you want to add anything to that, Kate?

No, I don't have a couple.

I don't have anything.

These are all great questions that really work.

VPRA and VHB are examining now.

So we don't really have concrete

Okay.

Another great question.

We have an RFI right now out to the industry trying to examine these exact answers.

Okay.

And so that's, again, it gets expanding on the project packaging.

Again, another great question.

RFI is out.

As I said before, these are technical details that we are examining now and how to keep folks moving through all modes as construction moves forward.

Alright, now I'm going to shrink it down to here.

Is it, I'm assuming they're talking about pedestrian bridge, the rail bridge would not need such.

So, I believe there will be wayfinding signage I think the wayfinding that may be available on NPS is under development now.

I've heard that there's various projects going on regarding signage and the movements through the parkland.

So we'll be coordinating with our partners at NPS.

And of course, data as we as we move these designs forward, very closely, we meet with them, you know, regularly about a host of issues affecting all agencies and entities.

Okay.

There's another question that's kind of specifically about the western side of the Ped Bike Bridge, kind of noting that there appears to be a large ramp and questions of the stairs that don't appear to go anywhere.

I think that that is referencing the Mount Vernon Trail connection.

So I'll just answer that.

I think that what we're talking about is that there is a planned connection to the Mount Vernon Trail that would include both a ramp and stairs.

And then there would be a ramp connection over into Long Bridge Park.

Bridge Connection.

Yes.

And then question about aesthetic treatments.

I'm not quite sure what that question is.

means.

So we are vetting the aesthetic qualities through the CFA and the NCPC and through our section 106 signatories, which include NPS, staff from NCPC, staff from CFA, DC SHPO, VDHR, which is the Virginia Department of Historic Resources,

FRA, and us.

Okay.

So then I think just another kind of going back to the width of the ped bike bridge, but the question about whether all sections are 14 feet wide, are there sections that are different widths?

If you are connecting to a ramp or a stair, it will be a different dimension.

Okay.

Let's see.

There are several questions also about electrification in the future.

Sure.

Okay.

All right.

That's a great question.

So ever since the EIS, Virginia and the District of Columbia have been a strong partnership for as you saw on one of the slides for over a decade now on the Long Bridge project, that includes the future of the pedestrian or the bike pedestrian bridge over the Potomac.

We are in discussions with the district regarding their future ownership of that bridge.

And there is funding in the in the proposed budget for the bridge and

in the out years of that budget.

So we're working on a memorandum of agreement regarding the bridge itself.

And then just kind of following up on some of the other questions related to kind of some of the topics, ped bike bridge, connectivity, aesthetics, MOT.

Yeah, sure.

Great question.

We do have the survey up this evening until July 10.

So that's one great way to be able to provide direct comments and input on the project.

We'll also be holding public meetings in the future.

and organizing pop-up events throughout the community to get the word out about the project as well.

And there's always the project website that will keep up to date with materials.

So then we have a question about the landscaping or comment about landscaping related to suggestion to include kind of planning of shrubs and ground covers that support pollinators, kind of talk about the importance of pollinators.

I'd be happy to.

So pollinators are under discussion now.

What NPS has a host of landscaping, basically a planting list that they have approved

and so on.

There are plenty of plans that have been developed to try to address this very issue.

And we'll keep refining that list as we move through this engineering design process and the various aesthetic processes as well, so you can get a good, healthy complexity of plantings that will survive over time and also be last and look attractive as much as possible.

So there is a question.

This goes back to, I think, construction methods, Kate.

So I can read it more directly, but I think it's, will the pedestrian crossover from Long Bridge Park over the GW Parkway onto Mount Vernon Trail open before the rest of the bridge for earlier use?

Oh, I see.

Yeah, we can't really make that call right now.

Okay.

Here's a fairly philosophical question.

Oh, that's a great question.

So if folks are participating as part of the EIS work, the Long Bridge project is a rail project to increase the capacity of the rail network between the southeast corridor and the northeast corridor and make

Riding Rail more convenient throughout Virginia and the District of Columbia.

We're doubling rail capacity for passenger rail and we're increasing freight operations as well and eliminating essentially a lane of traffic on night.

I-95 from the District Line throughout Virginia.

It's a great project and touts many economic development opportunities, as well as opportunities on rail that folks never had had in the past, including 15-minute headways, first-time weekend service, evening service,

and a host of benefits for passenger rail in Virginia.

It's a great and once in a lifetime opportunity for both folks in the region and nationwide to eliminate a two-track bottleneck over the Potomac River and really increase multimodal transportation throughout Virginia and the District of Columbia.

That's like a good wrap-up.

I was just going to say that was such a great response to that philosophical question.

I'm going to paste into the chat one more time some links you've already seen.

They're just repeats, but just want to make sure everyone sees them.

Ways to answer a survey, ways, websites we can follow.

We do know that there's a handful of questions that are not answered, but we just want to confirm we see you.

We see the questions.

We are going to capture those and share them with the project team, so rest assured that your questions are not unseen.

We will share them at the end.

We are at the top of the hour.

It is eight o'clock according to what I have.

We want to be respectful of everyone's time.

We know we've got bigger things to do on Wednesday, June 22nd at eight o'clock at night.

So with that, I'd like to turn it back over.

First off, I want to thank Leigh Farmer for double duty presenting and expert moderation of the Q&A.

And I actually know, Alan, sorry, just so I know you're about to, and I think it's all up there, but there were, I had left them till the end, but there were several questions that were just like kind of logistics around when, you know, where do I go to find the presentation?

Where do I go?

Give that briefly before you hand it off.

Sure.

We are posting a handful of content to the project website.

I know that the video we showed earlier is in the process of getting posted.

I'm unsure about the content of the slide deck, but that's a great segue for me to hand it back over to Kate Sherlene and the rest of the project team to kind of close this out for the night and just talk quickly about those next steps and what's in store for the rest of the public with respect to the bridge project.

Thanks, Alan.

I'll close it out.

We appreciate everyone's patience through these technological challenges that we had tonight.

So thanks to everybody on the call who's been participating.

We look forward to reaching out to you all again, likely in the winter or late fall as we meet milestones and have more to talk to you all about.

And please follow us on social media platforms, participate in our survey.

and feel free to contact us through various channels.

Have a great evening and we will be in touch in the future.