An environmental study, set to be released later this year, would limit phased construction in the Columbia River Crossing project, Metro staff said Tuesday.
That amount of phasing has been the subject of increased attention as some analysts have called into question the $3.6 billion project's financing plans.
Tuesday's Metro Council work session wasn't scheduled to be about financing; most of the conversation was about the council's upcoming vote on approving the Land Use Final Order and the Final Environmental Impact Statement.
But with the Oregonian and other news outlets increasingly putting the project under a microscope, some of the conversation inevitably shifted to Oregon Treasurer Ted Wheeler's initial analysis of the project's toll plans.
Metro Councilor Carl Hosticka asked Columbia River Crossing project manager Nancy Boyd about how a phased construction plan for the project would impact Metro's approvals for the project.
"We will start to get to the point of how we put together construction contracts… how you logically sequence construction," Boyd said.
Metro policy advisor Andy Cotugno said the Final Environmental Impact Statement limits the project's ability to have phased construction.
The statement, expected to be released this autumn, will say the project has two explicit phases – the bulk of the project, including the $400 million replacement bridge, the $750 million MAX extension into Vancouver and most of the $1.6 billion in freeway upgrades on either side of the river would be in the first phase.
"Phase two deals with longer-range addition of ramps at Marine Drive and SR 500," Cotugno said.
If the project planners decide not to build the single, integrated project, they'll have to go back to the federal government and amend the environmental study.
Cost issues also cast a cloud over the council's expectations for community enhancement funds, for projects to offset the negative impacts of the project's construction on nearby neighborhoods.
"What assurances do we have that (enhancement fees are) going to happen?" Hosticka said. Councilor Kathryn Harrington also asked about ways to ensure that the community enhancement aspect of the project would be implemented.
Mark Greenfield, a TriMet attorney who helped to write the original Land Use Final Order regulations in the 1990s, said putting such a mandate in place could be tricky. Areas around the project don't qualify for federal protection because of the affluence of the eastern side of Hayden Island, and the law limits environmental justice mitigations to officially designated communities.
More broadly, Greenfield gave the council an overview of the Land Use Final Order approval process, and its history in the Portland region. Originally conceived to speed approvals for the Hillsboro MAX extension, it was revived for a proposed light rail project connecting Oregon City to the Columbia River.
He pointed out that the process had been upheld in the courts, and wasn't limited to work on light rail projects – the order for the westside MAX also included freeway improvements to U.S. 26 between Highway 217 and downtown Portland.
Councilors weren't the only ones taking notes on the history and rules of the Land Use Final Order. Plaid Pantries CEO Chris Girard, a Columbia River Crossing opponent, was in the audience, as was Cascade Policy Institute CEO John Charles. He speculated that past Land Use Final Orders have been approved because nobody was paying attention to them, and said the findings TriMet used to support its application for a Land Use Final Order were weak.
"The cat's out of the bag now," Charles said after the work session. "It's going to attract a gigantic crowd."
The council's public hearing on the Land Use Final Order is scheduled for 2 p.m. Aug. 11.