Virginia’s Independent Green Party has three platforms, according to its chairman Carey Campbell, more candidates, less apathy; more trains, less traffic; and fiscally conservative, socially responsible.
The Independent Green Party will have four candidates for Congress on Virginia’s ballot this year, and it supports an additional three independent candidates.
On Monday, July 31, four candidates held a press conference at Montebello apartments. They were united in their call for the federal government to invest in rail to solve the metro area’s transportation issues.
Gail Parker, a candidate U.S. Senate running against Sen. George Allen (R) and James Webb (D), focused on the safety benefits of railroads over roads.
“We need to make Virginia safer for families,” she said, calling for rail lines to be built to a long list of Northern Virginia areas including Fort Belvoir, Tyson’s Corner an Dulles.
To illustrate the inadequacies of the current public transportation system, she held up a printed Metro itinerary demonstrating that it would take more than one and half hours to travel from Huntington Metro Station to Tyson’s Galleria by train and bus.
COL. MARVIN PIXTON, campaigning for the U.S. House 1st District (Fredericksburg to Williamsburg) against U.S. Rep. Jo Ann Davis (R) and Shawn O’Donnell (D) is running independently of the Independent Greens. He said he is doing so on the principal that he is “the voice of the people, not the puppet of the party.” But he added that he supports many Independent Green platforms, including rail.
He said the plans to widen highways and build new highways would only increase Northern Virginia’s transportation woes. “That does not solve the problem,” he said. “Because all that does is add congestion to the roads.”
Ferdinando Greco, who is running in the House’s 11th District against U.S. Rep. Tom Davis(R) and Andy Hurst (D) said that rail lines are the only realistic way to reduce congestion in the area.
He chose to focus on the environmental benefits of rail. “Trains will take cars off the roads,” he said. “[Rail] is cleaner. It’s safer. It’s more efficient.”
Jim Hurysz, campaigning in the 8th District against U.S. Rep. Jim Moran (D) and Tom O’Donoghue (R) said he was running against Moran, despite his own history of campaigning for Democratic candidates including John Kerry, because Moran was siding with Republicans too often.
Hurysz advocated using money being spent on the war in Iraq to build a modern rail system that would criss-cross the region and even the country.
“It’s very important that we get a 21st Century rail transportation system here, now,” he said. He said there should be local and express rail to popular commuting destinations like Fort Belvoir and the Pentagon.
He added that current plans to add more bus routes have not been accompanied by traffic mitigation policies, such as encouraging ride-sharing.
“The traffic is exploding. We really need and alternative. And that’s why I’m going to congress,” he said.
WHEN ASKED how Virginia would fund expensive rail projects, Parker said the state had a history of investing in high-quality transportation options, like divided highways.
She said she would work to change federal policies that encourage the building of more roads over more rail-lines by providing more matching federal funds to road construction projects. She also pointed out that yearly road-maintenance costs are much higher than they would be for railroad tracks.
“We can actually fund the rail with the savings on the maintenance and the matching federal money we will get,” she said.
Parker said that if elected she would work to create an auditable accounting system for the Department of Defense and eliminate its no-bid contracts. She said such a system would save billions of dollars that could be put towards rail.
Pixton, a retired Marine Corps Colonel, said that by running construction projects efficiently, new railroad lines could be built affordably.
“We don’t need taxes to increase to do it,” he said. “It’s spending money wisely.”
Greco offered another suggestion, “I’d like to take it to those who have it,” he said, listing several large oil companies. “I’d like to see them pay for rail.”