TRVÂ’s new price tag: $880.2 million in 2021 dollars

A major re-examination of the Trinity River Vision project will increase the price to $880.2 million in 2021 dollars, add two years to projectÂ’s timeline and change several major design features, including the bridges and the width of the channel.

To pay for the project without tapping cash-strapped local municipalities, Trinity River Vision Authority officials are recommending its board approve a 40-year tax increment financing (TIF) method. However, at the board meeting July 16, most members felt the TIF should end when the project is paid off, said Tarrant County judge Glen Whitley.

“Our feeling was we should pay the TIF off when the project is paid for and we believe that would be in 28 to 29 years,” he said. “If we can do that, I think that would be the board’s preference.”

The TIF would be an 80/20 split, with 80 going to pay for the project and 20 percent to the taxing entities. The TRVA also would use a non-interest loan from the Tarrant Regional Water District valued at $226 million, to be paid back by the TIF.

The input from the other partners, the city of Fort Worth, Tarrant County and the Tarrant Regional Water District, would stay the same. Most of the funding for the loan would come from Barnett Shale natural gas revenues received by the Tarrant Regional Water District, according to TRV officials.

“A TIF is considered a preferred option because it would not increase property taxes or compete with any other local commitments, is self-funding, and would not require any additional commitment from general funds,” said J.D. Granger, executive director of the project.

Granger said other funding options – such as tapping local general funds, general obligation bonds, property taxes, public improvement districts – were viewed as putting too much stress on local taxing entities.

“Everyone’s general funds are tight right now,” he said.

The interest-free loan from the water district would lower the projects financing costs and save taxpayers money, Granger said. It would also help pay for the costs of the project in the early years and allow payback in the later years when the TIF begins to generate more funds. 

The Trinity River Vision board of directors received a briefing on the funding options and new cost and project recommendations resulting from the review by Freese and Nichols Inc. at their July 16 meeting. The next step will be to seek approval from the various TIF boards involved to go forward with the plan.

One major change will be to the three bridges being built for the project. When the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said the TRVA should widen the channel to handle more water flow, the change impacted the cost of the bridges for the project. The bridge cost was originally $63.6 million, but with the new channel specifications, the cost ballooned to $114.7 million. Granger said he and his staff are recommending the board not build the original Bing Thom-designed bridges and examine other bridge options that fit the projectÂ’s budget. The TRVA staff will provide the board with suggested options that meet the original bridge budget. Those decisions must be made rather quickly, Granger said, as bridge design will begin in the next 60 days.

Whitley said the board was fine with the new designs.

“I don’t think anyone had a problem with that,” he said.

The board was interested in adding in bypass channel improvements – trees, landscaping and other architectural enhancements – that would add about $29.4 million to the project cost. These improvements would be the responsibility of local funding and would increase the costs of the project to $909.6 million in 2021 dollars.

Adopting the new TIF plan will allow the TRVA to potentially fund other optional components of the project including:

*Transportation options, such as light rail

*Helping relocate the Police and Fire Training Center

*More Gateway Park improvements, including a sports complex, amphitheater parking and a hike/bike trail extension

*Canals at several locations throughout the Central City portion of the project

*Help fund environmental cleanup for an area just north of the river

“The feeling I left the meeting with was that we wanted to do what is called for in regards to the bypass channel, the Gateway Park area, but that a lot of the options we were show, such as the canals, additional park structures and the like, we could put those things off until much later, or at least until we see the development start to take off,” Whitley said.

Whitley said once developers become interested in the area, the TRVA could then determine some of the other improvements it might make.

“ItÂ’s almost a chicken and egg situation,” he said. “If we can spur interest from the developers, then if they come in and say they want to spend a billion on a project, then we might kick in funds to make some additional improvements.” 

While some of the changes and additional costs to the project resulted from new requirements, such as the wider canal, other changes occurred through experience in working in the area.

For instance, many of the utilities in the area – originally thought of adequate for the project – will need to be upgraded. 

“When [developer] Tom Struhs started building Trinity Bluffs and began to tap into some of  the sewer lines up there, he found they were wood, not really adequate for the development planned for the area,” Granger said. “Those will have to be upgraded. So weÂ’ve learned a lot as weÂ’ve started work on the project.”

The increase in the projectÂ’s timeframe occurred as the TRVA and Freese and Nichols began to start carefully examining the construction schedule, said Woody Frossard, project manager for the TRVA.

“The bridges have to be built before the canal – you build bridges before you build the channels. So they built out a year-by-year path as to how to build the project, thatÂ’s how we ended up with a 12-year project,” Frossard said. 

To manage the construction, the TRVA has developed a software program that closely aligns the projectÂ’s schedule, cost and funding.

“Each one of our [project managers] get a read-only Web based application that tells exactly what they need to be doing at each point in the process,” Granger said.

Trinity River Vision development is an 800-acre flood control and mixed-use development slated for north Fort Worth that involves rerouting the Trinity River in the area. The rechanneling of the Trinity will create two islands and a 33-acre lake to the north of downtown Fort Worth. In May 2008, the Army Corps of Engineers recommended the river project be combined with a development slated for the 1,000-acre Gateway Park area.

Critics of the project say it is too expensive and is more of a development project than a flood-control project. Several citizens who oppose the current project and its funding have proposed less-drastic changes to the river.

rfrancis@bizpress.net