Letter to the Editor: Please Write to Councilwoman Mendelsohn

From HOA board member:

Please write and encourage as many of your congregants and their friends to write to Councilwoman Mendelsohn. By the way, in my Wednesday meeting with other HOA leaders impacted by the DART trains, I learned that the proposed pump station on Hillcrest as presently proposed will be very loud. This will probably impact Ohev Shalom if the pump station is not stopped.

There are 2 action items In today’s HOA newsletter. The first is to write Councilwoman Mendelsohn. This is part of our strategy to give her what she needs to go to the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) and demand they reopen a Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement where our input can actually count. That’s where we DEMAND grade separation.

We also need to STOP THE CITY from issuing any permits for Hillcrest. Unless we do, Mendelsohn is afraid that the FTA can use it as an excuse to allow DART to continue if the project has already started there…

Here’s the letter I wrote personally and the HOA Board is working on one to send for the neighborhood. Please feel free to cut and paste and send to Councilwoman Mendelsohn ASAP.

Councilwoman Mendeloshn:
We are very concerned that DART is moving forward with the Silver Line with areas that were not in the FEIS and not submitted to the public for their input. These are our concerns:

1.  The Final Environmental Impact Statement (FEIS) used to get DART federal funding did not include the pump station at Hillcrest.
Since it wasn’t in the FEIS, noise readings that DART used for the FEIS are suspect. The noise from the Hillcrest pump station concerns us.

2.  The Final Environmental Impact Statement did not include the pump station at Coit.
Omitting this station precluded the public from providing input.

3. DART is trying to ignore the Interlocal Agreement (ILA) it signed with the city.
The ILA the city and DART signed requires DART to build the train 11 feet below Coit. DART should not be allowed to ignore the law. The city must be more forceful with dealing with an entity that considers itself above the law.

4.  Sound wall locations were not addressed in the FEIS. Location was ambiguous with single track and double track.
Rocky Top Circle is an area with the mandated federal sound walls because of noise.  Noise is very unhealthy and damaging to families. Sound walls must be addressed before this project is issued permits.

5. Dickerson Crossing at grade is unsafe.
It is unacceptable that the city council claims to be concerned with equity, but doesn’t act when it can to address it. The city is ignoring equity by allowing DART to build DART’s Silver Line at-grade with its 60-90 trains daily in a neighborhood with hundreds of poor black and brown children. The city council is making it more dangerous for these Dallas children when council members claim to be their advocates. Perhaps the Council members who so strongly and often speak about equity would now take this as their personal mission to champion the safety of these school children and demand grade separation.
Please  hold DART accountable for everything they agreed to in the ILA especially the Coit Road depth of 11 feet.
Please amplify our safety concerns to other elected officials. it is not right that DART is allowed to include items not in the FEIS when all of our neighbors  have been asking for grade separation at Meandering Way for years.
Please address our not being able to give input to DART on the items that were omitted in the FEIS.
Please support the opening of the Supplemental EIS based on these concerns.
It is most important that Dallas DOES NOT ISSUE ANY PERMITS for Hillcrest Road until a Supplemental EIS is considered.

Thanks for your help and support of our safety concerns.