Washington County commissioners hear TriMet, Metro briefing on TV Highway locally preferred alternative

TriMet and Metro officials on Feb. 11 presented the Washington County Board of Commissioners with a locally preferred alternative (LPA) for the TV Highway Transit and Safety Project, a proposed bus rapid transit corridor that project staff estimate would cost about $300,000,000 and put higher-quality stations, crossings and zero-emission buses along Line 57 between Beaverton Transit Center and Forest Grove.

The presentation described the project as a safety and reliability upgrade for a corridor TriMet staff said has among the region's highest pedestrian crash rates and is the highest-ridership TriMet bus line in Washington County. "It's the highest ridership in Washington County with over 6,000 riders a day," Metro principal regional planner Jess Sadev said.

Why it matters: Project managers said the LPA is sized to be eligible for the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) Small Starts program, which the presenters said can provide up to $150,000,000 in federal funds. Project staff told commissioners they need local partners to commit a combined $100,000,000 to leverage federal funding and to support a $50,000,000 request to the state in lottery-backed bonds. Washington County staff told the board the county's planned contribution is $12,000,000, to be repurposed from previously set-aside local funds.

What the LPA would provide: TriMet project manager David Alwis said the project preserves core transit and safety elements while bringing the estimated total cost down from a roughly $550,000,000 concept to the current $300,000,000 design. Key components described by staff include rapid transit station pairs linked by enhanced crossings, curbed station platforms with shelters, seating and real-time arrival information, transit signal priority at signals along the corridor (about 59 signals), all-door boarding with three-door vehicles, and a fleet of zero-emission buses targeted to be battery-electric. "We're targeting about a 20% improvement in travel time," Alwis said; staff later recommended stakeholders plan conservatively for a 15–20% travel-time gain.

Station locations and rider experience: Staff said average station spacing in the LPA is just over one-third of a mile, with options in some communities (notably Cornelius) still under local consideration. The project team reported outreach this fall produced about 1,000 survey responses, with bilingual outreach in English, Spanish and Vietnamese and on-board surveys; about 32% of respondents said they speak Spanish at home and roughly 15% of surveys were completed in Spanish. Staff reported higher-than-expected wheelchair-lift activity at some stops and said stop-location decisions considered lift use, high ridership, transfer points and community-identified locations.

Funding and timeline: Project staff said the $300,000,000 target supports eligibility for the FTA Small Starts cap of $150,000,000 and that the local funding plan would break down roughly as $30,000,000 from a regional bond program request, $5,000,000 already allocated from federal carbon-reduction funds, and the remaining $65,000,000 to be contributed by TriMet, Washington County and the four corridor cities. TriMet plans to apply for project development this summer; staff said project development requires all project-development funds to be committed (about $25,000,000) before submission. Staff described the next federal milestone at 30% design (summer 2026), when an additional $20,000,000 would be needed, and a construction grant submission targeted for summer 2027. If all proceeds as planned, TriMet staff said the corridor could enter service in fall 2030.

County funding and conditions: A county staff member said Washington County is proposing to repurpose $12,000,000 from previously set-aside local funds toward the TV Highway project. Commissioners pressed staff for clarity about the conditions that would bring the previously paused Southwest Corridor project back and whether repurposing funds could create future gaps; staff responded that the county and regional partners would need to revisit those longer-term decisions and that jurisdictions never fully had the Southwest Corridor contributions in-hand.

Remaining issues and risks: Presenters noted certain amenities are not in the current budget (for example, corridor-wide pedestrian-scale lighting), and that rights-of-way negotiations—particularly where stations must be sited within the Union Pacific Railroad corridor—remain challenging. Staff characterized the project's success as contingent on sustained interagency coordination and securing the anticipated federal and state funding.

Next steps: The LPA is scheduled for a steering committee vote later in the week; TriMet staff will seek the steering committee's approval of the LPA and the board was asked to provide concurrence and to prepare for an intergovernmental agreement (IGA) committing the county's share across fiscal years if the project proceeds. Commissioners signaled informal support for the LPA and for Commissioner Faez to represent the county steering-committee position, but no formal county vote on the LPA occurred at the Feb. 11 work session.

The county will return to the board in spring 2025 with the formal LPA for board consideration and with proposed funding commitments and IGA language, staff said.