Extra pillars?

October 24, 2013

One of the stated purposes for our city’s multiple deals with the railroads these last few years was to help the trains go through El Paso faster.  The city paid a high price for land that it needed to build the new ball park.  Railroad crossings around town were closed as part of the bargain.

Freeway closed

This Friday, to use the words of a tweet from an El Paso Times reporter, a train “derailed off tracks”.  One of the cars struck a pillar supporting Interstate 10 as it crosses over Cotton Street.

The train was evidently travelling at less than 10 miles per hour when the incident occurred.  The Times published this picture:

Cottonbridge

According to the Times, “TxDOT officials said a structural engineer from Austin visited the site early Saturday morning to inspect the Cotton Bridge columns and that the closure of I-10 West was just a safety measure.”

Well I guess looking at the picture that is a safety measure, otherwise we wasted money building the pillar in the first place.

How much faster

So now the question is how much faster would the city like the trains to go?

We deserve better

Brutus

3 Comments | Ball park, City government, El Paso Times | Permalink
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Planned Failure

October 18, 2013

The city commissioned a traffic study for the ball park.  The revised edition was published December 3, 2012.

The study dealt with Missouri and Santa Fe streets and not the broader traffic situation around the area.  The results were published with letter grades being given for predicted level of service  ranging from A (for good) to F (bad).  Charts were presented for inbound (before the game) and outbound traffic delays.

We all know that delays will occur whenever an event with a lot of patrons occurs.  The predicted results speak for themselves.

Inbound

The intersection of Santa Fe and Wyoming (leaving I-10 from the west) earned a grade of “F” with an anticipated delay of 202.8 seconds (the study did not specifically indicate that the number was in seconds but I believe that 202.8 minutes would be worse than an “F”).

As a point of reference the second worst intersection along Santa Fe (Santa Fe and Paisano) got a “D” with a predicted delay of 50.4.   If a “D” is not good at 50.4 then a score of 202.8 is really bad.  The term the report used was “excessive delay”.

Outbound

Santa Fe and Sheldon (the road just south of the civic center parking garage exit) got an incredible 433.5 with Santa Fe at Yandell (for those going west) getting  a “D” at 47.4.

It gets worse

The study tried to predict what would happen if there was an event at both the baseball park and the civic center at the same time.

Incoming traffic caused four intersections to be rated “F” (Missouri at Kansas, Missouri at Oregon, Santa Fe at Wyoming, and Santa Fe at Franklin).  Santa Fe at Wyoming jumped up to a delay of 467.4.  Two intersections got rated “E”.  Maybe some school kids should petition their schools to get “E” added to the grading system.  It is obviously better than an “F”.

Outbound traffic shows five intersections rated “F” (Santa Fe at Yandell, Santa Fe at Wyoming, Santa Fe at Franklin, Santa Fe at Main, and Santa Fe at Sheldon).  Sheldon takes the cake with a delay of 875.9.

Not complete

The study did not consider what base level traffic will be when the downtown cabal succeeds in revitalizing downtown and there are a lot more people down there.

Nor did it consider what would happen if there was an simultaneous event at the Plaza Theater.

There are plans that have been presented to the city where the recommendation is to place the new sports arena on top of the civic center.  Yes, they suggest tearing down the civic center.  Who knows what will happen then.

Spend money

The report suggests:

COEP (city of El Paso) should consider the use police [sic] or code enforcement officers for traffic control at signalized intersections, and intersections where turning movements will be numerous …

By the way, the city’s contract with the baseball team requires the city to pay for the police.

We deserve better

Brutus

4 Comments | Ball park, City government | Permalink
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Taxing Times

October 16, 2013

The El Paso Times recently reported that the city of El Paso’s sales tax revenue has increased 2.3 percent for the year through October.

What they did not report was what Brutus mentioned the other day in Bad Bets.

While the increase in the sales tax collections is good news, the bad news is that the city is counting on (they have already budgeted) a 4.3 percent increase.

Hotel Occupancy Tax revenues are down one percent while the city told us to expect a three percent increase.

Remember that the city is now telling us that they will have to use general fund revenue to supplement bond payments for the ball park.

Unless things turn around we are looking at a revenue shortfall.  What services will have to be cut or what fees will have to be increased?

There was a time when the reporters at the Times researched their articles instead of just printing what some government agency asked them to print.

Muckraker

8 Comments | Ball park, City government, El Paso Times | Permalink
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Another ball park consultant

October 15, 2013

The city council agenda for October 15, 2013 has another interesting ball park contract on it.

The item would authorize the city manager to sign a contract in the amount of $347,474 (plus another $50,000 if it is needed) for “Construction Testing and Inspection Services for El Paso Ballpark’’.

The backup material for council indicates that the funding source might be the baseball stadium construction accounts.  That’s the one that has 50, no 64, no 72 million dollars allocated to it so far.  Unfortunately the resolution contains this phrase that we see all too often:

“and that the City Manager be authorized to establish the funding sources and make any necessary budget transfers and execute any and all documents necessary for execution of this agreement.”

In other words the city manager can take the money from whatever account she wants to.

There are millions of dollars being spent for projects around the ball park that are not being allocated to the $72 million dollar number that we see now.

Lots of technical help

In Inside Job I pointed out that we already have a contract for an owner’s representative for $853,000, and a contract with an architect for $3,820,680.  We have also paid for traffic studies and demolition studies.  One would think that with these professionals working along side of our city financial experts that we could build a $38 million dollar ball park for $38 million dollars.

Not another penny

The engineer being hired signed his part of the agreement July 1, 2013.  Why has it taken so long for this contract to come before council?  Could it be that other bigger fish had to be fried and city staff wanted to let the dust settle?

We deserve better

Brutus

1 Comment | Ball park, City government | Permalink
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Opening Day

October 14, 2013

According to this article in the Times opening day for our new ball park will be April 11, 2014.  The Pacific Coast League arranged the schedule so that our team will play the first few games of the season out of town to allow the ball park to be completed.

The October 15, 2013 city council agenda has the latest “Guaranteed Maximum Price Amendment” with the construction company they hired to build the ball park.

Surprise, Surprise!

My initial reading of the amendment yielded these jewels:

  • The ball park will enjoy substantial completion by April 28, 2014.  That’s a little late for an April 11 opening.
  • “Substantial Completion is defined as the Ballpark being ready for a full capacity Triple-A baseball event.  However, this may require code “work arounds” such as fire watch, extra stadium staff for security, etc. which costs will be borne by others.”  I may be wrong but I think that code work arounds are the same as code violations.
  • Final completion of the park is scheduled for August 31, 2014.  The regular season ends September 1, 2014.
  • The document excludes certain things from the price, like:
    • railroad platforms and bridge
    • railroad platform foundations
    • Missouri and Durango street improvements
    • offsite improvements/work (this probably includes the water and sewer work the city is not talking about as well as the pedestrian and road work around the park)
    • special construction provisions required at railroad
    • porcelain/art signage
    • 4 TOPP or 2 TOPP tables and loose chairs
    • aluminum and fabric sun shades

Reasons for increase

The presentation for city council includes a page that offers these reasons:

“Construction commenced before delivery of complete design.  Only recently has the design advanced to the point to allow the CMAR [Construction Manager at Risk] to set GMP [Guaranteed Maximum Price]”

“Project Schedule — Drives costs up due to overtime, expedited materials, etc.”

“Bids have not been as favorable as projected:  Bids have been as competitive as possible; however, many contractors lack the resources necessary to meet the schedule.”

In other words we could have built the ball park for less money if the team played in Tucson or at Cohen Stadium during 2014 and moved to the new ball park in 2015.

We deserve better

Brutus

5 Comments | Ball park, City government, El Paso Times | Permalink
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