High-Wire Act

The Fairfax supervisors should vote for elevated rail.

TUNNEL FEVER has once again gripped Fairfax County, and, according to Chairman Gerald E. Connolly (D), the Board of Supervisors faces an unattractive choice this month. The board is scheduled to vote June 18 on whether to commit its share of federal money for building the Dulles rail extension, an addition to Metrorail's Orange Line that would eventually run to Dulles International Airport. Voting yes would reduce the already slim chances for a popular proposal to dig a tunnel underneath Tysons Corner, a proposal that would help make the region's "second downtown" significantly more pedestrian friendly and aesthetically appealing. But voting no -- or, as some tunnel advocates would like, voting yes with conditions -- would diminish the chances for a tunnel, too, because it would imperil federal funding for the whole project, which currently entails an elevated track above Tysons.

We have supported the tunnel option. A subway would help transform Tysons from a pedestrian's nightmare into an urban space capable of supporting high-density development, smartly positioned astride a transit line. However, the priority must be to build the rail line, elevated or sunken. The board should approve the project without conditions when it meets this month.

Mr. Connolly, who would prefer a tunnel, nevertheless insists that disagreement among local authorities on the plans under review at the Federal Transit Administration, which call for an elevated track, could doom the project. He also points out that three recent studies concluded that a tunnel would be more expensive, possibly disqualifying it from receiving federal cash. And pausing to pursue the tunnel option might result in Northern Virginia getting knocked out of line for federal money. Die-hard tunnel advocates, on the other hand, complain that the contract Fairfax is considering did not emerge from a competitive bidding process and that the supervisors should insist on bidding out the tunnel option, a plan that supporters think will not ultimately run afoul of federal authorities.

The supervisors can vote yes while restating their desire to reexamine the possibility of building a tunnel. But any binding conditions might very well end up destroying Fairfax's best chance in decades of getting a new public transit corridor -- and reaping the many benefits it will bring. It's time to build the Dulles extension.