The campaign for Richmond has begun and we have had a clear demonstration of what is wrong with the last several holders of the governor’s office in Richmond: the Hampton Road Bridge Tunnel.
Let me be clear, the Hampton Road Bridge Tunnel is by no means the critical element of the Governor’s office. But, in this particular case, it is indicative of something larger being very wrong.
I first moved to the Hampton Roads area in the summer of 2004, courtesy of the Navy. Shortly after I arrived there was a hurricane warning and there was the usual talk about possible evacuations, etc. Since then each summer storm season has brought new revelations about the preparations, or lack thereof, of the various tunnels in the Hampton Roads area.
What this all has to do with the governor is fairly straightforward. Hampton Roads is the largest port in the commonwealth and the largest metropolitan area. It is also the site of the largest Naval port in the world, which, while obviously not being a direct responsibility of the governor, should highlight that particular care and preparation should be made to ensure that, beyond the preparations made by the military, it is incumbent on the commonwealth to also be prepared to address crises or various disasters in the port.
As I was interested both from a professional perspective and a personal one (my wife and I now lived here), shortly after we transferred here I asked around to see what the various plans looked like. I never found any copies of the plans but I was assured that there were plans and that they were well worked out and that they were regularly exercised.
And so, yesterday, July 2nd 2009, after several squalls passed through the area, the Hampton Roads Bridge Tunnel began to flood. When all was said and done, westbound traffic was stopped for roughly eight hours. The public was informed this morning that additional work will be required on the tunnel tonight (the 3rd).
Several observations should be made:
The Commonwealth’s “contingency plans” are no good. Whatever the plans were, they don’t work. Which means that, in the event of the need for a real evacuation, the evacuation plan probably won’t work – unless you expect that when ordered there are no accidents and no surprises, not exactly a good planning assumption.
There will be immediate responses that the plan is being revised, etc. Revising the plan now, even if it could be revised within the next several weeks, still won’t address the simple fact that the ‘new’ plan has not been ‘exercised.’ No one will have practiced implementing this new plan. In short, the area and the Commonwealth are not ready for a major storm or other crisis event.
The planning process is broken. Good planning is based on a sound planning process. In this case it is demonstrably incapable of producing a good plan. The process needs to be changed. And the people who manage the planning process need to be changed – they failed.
This is major problem. Putting together crisis and contingency plans is the most basic type of planning: the plan is limited in scope, it is short in duration, and there is a general understanding that whatever assets are needed during the crisis will be provided. In short, a crisis is, from a planning perspective, putting together a crisis plan is the easiest planning you will do.
Therefore, is we find that the Commonwealth and VDOT are incapable of putting together a workable crisis plan that addresses a contingent loss of the Hampton Roads Bridge Tunnel (HRBT), then we must conclude that the more difficult long term plans for the Commonwealth are in fact poorly crafted and probably less likely to work than the plans for the HRBT.
Furthermore, whatever the claim that is made about how well the ‘seven cities’ (Norfolk, Virginia Beach, Chesapeake, Hampton, Newport News, Portsmouth, and Suffolk) work together, clearly it isn’t well enough to at least identify that the various disaster plans don’t work. That the governor, who ostensibly should be interested in the area, should provide both leadership and pressure to the leadership of the seven cities to help facilitate these plans, goes without saying. That the last several governors have failed to do so is also now glaringly clear.
The process for testing and exercising the plans also is broken. Good plans require more than a sound process, they require exercising and review – looking at the ‘game film’ – as part of a process of making the plan better. The mayors’ offices and city councils and the fire and police departments and other first responders are all staffed by dedicated and hard-working men and women. But the exercise process and the inspection, review and lessons learned process failed, as has key elements of the leadership. There needs to be a detailed review of the entire exercise and review process and the appropriate parties need to be retrained.
The fact is that leadership failed at several levels, to include the governor’s office. The citizens of Virginia need to address that problem this year. It will do us no good to select someone who talks a good game but can’t deliver on the most basic requirement of a government: providing for public safety. The next governor of Virginia should be more than a mouthpiece, he has to be both competent in organizing and leading, as well as committed to doing the hard work, the planning and the execution of the plan, to keep the commonwealth ready and secure. Instead of talk, let’s insist on a governor who ahs real leadership experience, and a demonstrated track record pulling together a team, crafting a plan and carrying out the plan.
Let me be clear, the Hampton Road Bridge Tunnel is by no means the critical element of the Governor’s office. But, in this particular case, it is indicative of something larger being very wrong.
I first moved to the Hampton Roads area in the summer of 2004, courtesy of the Navy. Shortly after I arrived there was a hurricane warning and there was the usual talk about possible evacuations, etc. Since then each summer storm season has brought new revelations about the preparations, or lack thereof, of the various tunnels in the Hampton Roads area.
What this all has to do with the governor is fairly straightforward. Hampton Roads is the largest port in the commonwealth and the largest metropolitan area. It is also the site of the largest Naval port in the world, which, while obviously not being a direct responsibility of the governor, should highlight that particular care and preparation should be made to ensure that, beyond the preparations made by the military, it is incumbent on the commonwealth to also be prepared to address crises or various disasters in the port.
As I was interested both from a professional perspective and a personal one (my wife and I now lived here), shortly after we transferred here I asked around to see what the various plans looked like. I never found any copies of the plans but I was assured that there were plans and that they were well worked out and that they were regularly exercised.
And so, yesterday, July 2nd 2009, after several squalls passed through the area, the Hampton Roads Bridge Tunnel began to flood. When all was said and done, westbound traffic was stopped for roughly eight hours. The public was informed this morning that additional work will be required on the tunnel tonight (the 3rd).
Several observations should be made:
The Commonwealth’s “contingency plans” are no good. Whatever the plans were, they don’t work. Which means that, in the event of the need for a real evacuation, the evacuation plan probably won’t work – unless you expect that when ordered there are no accidents and no surprises, not exactly a good planning assumption.
There will be immediate responses that the plan is being revised, etc. Revising the plan now, even if it could be revised within the next several weeks, still won’t address the simple fact that the ‘new’ plan has not been ‘exercised.’ No one will have practiced implementing this new plan. In short, the area and the Commonwealth are not ready for a major storm or other crisis event.
The planning process is broken. Good planning is based on a sound planning process. In this case it is demonstrably incapable of producing a good plan. The process needs to be changed. And the people who manage the planning process need to be changed – they failed.
This is major problem. Putting together crisis and contingency plans is the most basic type of planning: the plan is limited in scope, it is short in duration, and there is a general understanding that whatever assets are needed during the crisis will be provided. In short, a crisis is, from a planning perspective, putting together a crisis plan is the easiest planning you will do.
Therefore, is we find that the Commonwealth and VDOT are incapable of putting together a workable crisis plan that addresses a contingent loss of the Hampton Roads Bridge Tunnel (HRBT), then we must conclude that the more difficult long term plans for the Commonwealth are in fact poorly crafted and probably less likely to work than the plans for the HRBT.
Furthermore, whatever the claim that is made about how well the ‘seven cities’ (Norfolk, Virginia Beach, Chesapeake, Hampton, Newport News, Portsmouth, and Suffolk) work together, clearly it isn’t well enough to at least identify that the various disaster plans don’t work. That the governor, who ostensibly should be interested in the area, should provide both leadership and pressure to the leadership of the seven cities to help facilitate these plans, goes without saying. That the last several governors have failed to do so is also now glaringly clear.
The process for testing and exercising the plans also is broken. Good plans require more than a sound process, they require exercising and review – looking at the ‘game film’ – as part of a process of making the plan better. The mayors’ offices and city councils and the fire and police departments and other first responders are all staffed by dedicated and hard-working men and women. But the exercise process and the inspection, review and lessons learned process failed, as has key elements of the leadership. There needs to be a detailed review of the entire exercise and review process and the appropriate parties need to be retrained.
The fact is that leadership failed at several levels, to include the governor’s office. The citizens of Virginia need to address that problem this year. It will do us no good to select someone who talks a good game but can’t deliver on the most basic requirement of a government: providing for public safety. The next governor of Virginia should be more than a mouthpiece, he has to be both competent in organizing and leading, as well as committed to doing the hard work, the planning and the execution of the plan, to keep the commonwealth ready and secure. Instead of talk, let’s insist on a governor who ahs real leadership experience, and a demonstrated track record pulling together a team, crafting a plan and carrying out the plan.
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