Covington sat down with The Washington Post’s Jeremy Borden in the county’s old courthouse — which doubles as his Brentsville District office — to answer a few questions about all things rail and VRE’s importance in connecting people and driving economic growth.
VRE Chief Executive Dale Zehner announced last week that he would retire, effective June 30th. What thoughts do you have on his tenure?
The old rail cars caused a lot of headaches for maintenance. [Zehner] has been a champion of streamlining the rail cars, to replace old cars with a new, uniform group of cars. With the addition of [rail contractor] Keolis, VRE has been in the higher 90 [percent on time] for the past six months or so. That’s a sign of having a consistent fleet, and it’s reflective, too, of all-time rider highs. He’s at the top of his game. We’ll discuss at our next board meeting the process for hiring a new CEO.
What’s the biggest issue for VRE going forward?
Capacity. It will be the long-term issue for VRE. We have to find more capacity for more trains at Union Station in D.C. That’s part of a broader national discussion, of how important are trains in America today. We also need to talk about interconnectivity with Metro, with buses.
What are some of your goals for VRE as chairman and a longtime member of regional transit boards?
We have an opportunity, as that Silver Line goes out to Dulles, to create the first circular mass transit system in the D.C. area. It links you into Metro, but more importantly, it ties Dulles into this whole grid. You could be at the Pentagon in the morning and Dulles in the afternoon. There’s a potential to do an environmental impact study this year or next year . . . on how we get VRE to Gainesville. That’s a big goal of mine.
This year, I’d like to see us at least finish with buying the new trains, figuring out how to make that budget work. Completing those purchases would be an important thing to do this year.
Why is a new Gainesville stop so important?
[The Virginia Department of Transportation] is spending millions on overpasses at the intersection of Interstate 66 and U.S. 29 [in Gainesville]. It’s going to be a critical location long-term for future economic development.
How does VRE fit into the larger scheme of mass transit and economic development in Northern Virginia?
I think that VRE is our Metro. The amount of money to extend Metro [to Prince William], it’s too expensive a proposal. In the future, VRE will also give us access to other areas of the state. Containing development, we talk about doing that and reducing sprawl. High-end retail and office space will also be able to grow around those hubs.
Riders want Wi-Fi access. Why has that been so difficult to provide?
The infrastructure costs are too high. It’s become a question of adding capacity or adding Wi-Fi. With the iPads being so popular, and people getting the 3G network, there’s a question of whether we need it. But I’m going to guess we’re going to find 3G access isn’t as prevalent as we thought. I’ve got an iPad, and I didn’t buy the 3G. We’ll revisit it this year and see if there’s something we can do to make it happen.
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