Casino's effect on South Philadelphia traffic draws city attention

City Council yesterday heard three versions - good, maybe bad and uncertain - of the future for traffic in South Philly if a casino is built on the riverfront.

Foxwoods, the proposed casino, repeated its claim that traffic along busy Columbus Boulevard will be improved by the project.

Traffic engineers hired by City Council said Foxwoods has underestimated how many cars will be drawn to the casino and used a flawed computer program to come up with its conclusions.

And the city Streets Department's chief traffic engineer and PennDOT said they won't be done examining Foxwoods' plans for about a month. That review focuses only on the first phase of construction, primarily the casino and its parking garage, and not later phases.

Ignoring the later phases bothered some Council members.

"It's not a very prudent way of doing things, in my opinion," Council President Anna Verna said.

Foxwoods consultant Jeff Greene laid out plans to change traffic signals and adjust lanes but ran into skepticism for the casino's claim of improved traffic flow with hundreds of new cars added to the roadways.

"It's just counterintuitive," Councilman Jim Kenney said of the area, which already has heavy traffic. "I'm sorry, it just doesn't make any sense whatsoever."

Traffic engineers from Stantec Consulting, hired last year by Council to examine the impact of Foxwoods, said they had concerns about the proposed casino's projections on how many cars might show up at peak times. They also said they had found a "coding error" in the computer software used by Foxwoods to estimate traffic impacts.

With that flaw, Foxwoods' plans might not be enough to deal with the extra traffic during certain times, Stantec engineer Louis Luglio told Council.

Foxwoods attorney Carl Primavera later protested that conclusion, saying the casino used the "gold standard" software mandated by the city and PennDOT, while Council's traffic engineers used a newer version of the same software.

Foxwoods plans to ask the software company why the two versions have different results.

"There may well be a glitch that's easily explained," Primavera added.

Greene also defended his traffic study and the use of the computer program.

"I believe that I did it correctly," Greene said, noting that he has sent his computer models to the city and PennDOT for examination. "I believe our study is exactly correct and should go forward as it sits. It is exactly the way that we've all been doing it for a long time here in the Philadelphia area."

Yesterday's hearing was the second of four planned by Council's Rules Committee to consider zoning changes needed to allow Foxwoods to begin construction. The next hearing, on April 4, will focus on public safety, taxes and waterfront-land issues. Public testimony will be heard at the last hearing on April 14. *