Honolulu mass transit proponents are determined to keep the pedal to the metal in 2007, pushing forward with plans to finance and build a system as quickly as possible.

Mayor Mufi Hannemann said he plans to brief Federal Transit Administration officials in mid-January on the city's progress and select the first leg of the line by month's end. By February, the city wants to begin preliminary engineering and an environmental impact statement, all with an optimistic eye to starting construction by the end of 2009.

The efforts are part of a city plan to build off the momentum generated by the passage of a transit tax and selection of a preferred transit mode and route in the last two years, reaching a point further and faster than any of the city's previous attempts to build transit over the past three decades.

Critics, and even supporters, of the plan warn, however, that there's a long, bumpy road ahead. Competition for federal funds will be fierce, and local opposition from taxpayers and environmentalists still could delay or derail the project, they said.

"We're not going to let anything distract us. We're going to keep pushing at it because it's just too important," Hannemann said. "Now that we've put the meat and potatoes on the table, we really believe that the public will be behind it."

A key part of the work in 2007 will be identifying possible funding sources for the multibillion-dollar transit project. A new tax surcharge that goes into effect tomorrow is expected to raise about $164 million in its first year and $3 billion over the 15-year life of the tax. But the city will have to come up with far more than that to complete the entire system selected by the City Council, a system more than 30 miles long with estimated construction costs of at least $5 billion.

FUNDING PIPELINE

The city also can seek funds from a number of federal programs, including those designed to aid new transit starts, the military, public housing, airports and other places that could be served by the line, said U.S. Rep. Neil Abercrombie.

"Now that we've passed the plan come the hard, cold realities of financing," Abercrombie said.

While getting in the Federal Transit Administration's regular funding pipeline for new projects will take years, Abercrombie said he plans to take details of the city's progress to Congress in January and immediately seek millions of dollars in "discretionary funds," money in the Transportation Department's budget that is made available to Congress outside of the regular FTA process.

About $1.5 billion in discretionary funds is available this year, the FTA said.

"The competition is fierce, but we've got a leg up now because we have put together a good game plan, and our congressional delegation can make a really good case," Abercrombie said.

If Honolulu does become eligible for the big bucks — and the city is talking about seeking up to $1 billion in federal funding — the money likely wouldn't become available for years, until the city completes its environmental and preliminary engineering studies and receives a "full-funding grant agreement" from the government, an FTA spokesman in Washington, D.C., said last week.

Obtaining that approval involves a complex, ongoing rating and evaluation process that pits hundreds of jurisdictions seeking funds against one another. The projects are evaluated on factors such as environmental benefits, operating efficiency, cost benefits and potential land use, according to the FTA's Web site.

Once all those things are considered, projects are rated on a five-step scale from low to high and given funding accordingly each year. Honolulu likely would not receive any benefits from that system until at least the 2009 fiscal year, the spokesman said.

However, Hannemann said he'll ask FTA officials to provide up to $40 million to help complete the preliminary studies and then have that deducted from whatever funds the city eventually receives under the full funding agreement. Abercrombie said he'll seek similar funding from the discretionary funds. The city also will receive some federal funding under the FTA's programs for buses, which will be considered an integral part of the fixed-guideway feeder system, Hannemann said.

FEDERAL LIMITS

Although FTA regulations allow the agency to cover up to 80 percent of a project's costs under the New Start program, a congressional mandate has limited that in recent years to no more than 60 percent, and only a few large cities such as New York and Los Angeles have received even that much.

"We'll take 100 percent of whatever we can get," said Abercrombie, who expects Hawai'i's congressional delegation to also obtain funds from other budget areas, such as the U.S. Defense Department, which could benefit by having a rail station at Pearl Harbor or Hickam Air Force Base.

Hannemann said he'll also begin preliminary discussions with the City Council and others to establish a new transit authority agency that would run the mass- transit system once it's built.

"Just like the bus system (which is operated by a private contractor, O'ahu Transit Services), I believe the city really doesn't have the resources to run a rail line. It's never too early to start thinking about these things," he said.

Critics, though, think it is too early.

"The mayor is continually trying to convey to the public that this transit process is a done deal," said rail opponent Cliff Slater in a Web site posting for the group Honolulutransit.com. "However, it has at least three years to go before a shovel hits the dirt. Scoping has yet to be done. The draft environmental impact statement has to be drafted, public hearings held and comments taken and addressed."

All of that will lead up to a record of decision, or ROD, by the FTA, which amounts to a final go-ahead for a project. "Our alert readers may remember that at the end of the multiyear BRT (Bus Rapid Transit) process, the FTA withdrew their ROD and that was the end of that folly," Slater said.

Hannemann said he'll work to overcome those obstacles.

"I want to make sure that we do things right for future councils and mayors," he said. "A lot of positive things are happening to help us change the feeling that there's no way this can happen."

Reach Mike Leidemann at mleidemann@honoluluadvertiser.com.