"Proposition 11: The issuance of $246,000,000 general obligation Trinity River Corridor Project bonds, the project to include floodways, levees, waterways, open space, recreational facilities, the Trinity Parkway and related street improvements, and other related, necessary, and incidental improvements to the Trinity River Corridor."

Two key words are conspicuously absent: "toll" and "road."

People are often surprised to learn that the city of Dallas and the North Texas Tollway Authority are planning to build a large toll road in our floodway, between our levees ? the grass hills along the river that protect our city from catastrophic flooding. Residents are even more surprised to learn about the drastic changes the city has made to the Trinity River Project since 1998.

Almost a decade ago, the city sold voters a vision of parks, lakes and sailboats. After the election, in a classic bait and switch, City Hall quickly dispensed with any pretense that this was anything other than a roads project. Originally envisioned as a low-speed parkway that would provide direct access to the park, the "Trinity Parkway" quickly devolved into a high-speed toll road completely disconnected from the park.

Other changes followed:

?In 1998, the estimated cost of the Trinity Parkway was $394 million. Today, the toll road is $600 million over budget and will cost more than $1 billion. City officials are unable to provide a final cost estimate.

?In 1998, the city claimed that flood control was a critical component of the Trinity River Corridor Project. This February, we learned that the Tollway Authority intends to seek a waiver from the federal government to build the road using pre-Katrina safety standards, instead of new, more stringent standards being developed in response to the disaster in New Orleans.

?Last November, the city moved the toll road even farther into the park in response to safety concerns by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, who feared that the road would weaken our levees. By the city's own calculation ? and despite furious backpedaling and word-parsing ? this will eliminate one-third of the downtown Trinity parkland and reduce the size of our lakes.

?The Corps also confirmed that the toll road will flood and that they must reserve the right to rip out sections of the road to repair our levees.

?There are no guarantees that this toll road will not be sold to a foreign company. In fact, last week, the state Senate transportation committee exempted the road from a proposed two-year ban on long-term toll road leases with private companies.

City Hall bureaucrats and politicians dismiss these fundamental changes as minor "tweaks." They are offended by the notion that Dallas residents, who are paying for this project, have the gall to demand accountability. So they resort to stale political scare tactics, arguing that any effort to bring accountability and transparency to this project is irresponsible and will result in delay.

(Never mind that all of their previous timelines have come and gone. At least four start dates for the toll road have been printed in this very newspaper: 2002, 2003, 2007 and 2008. This time, they claim, the road will absolutely, positively start construction in 2010. Probably.)

Because of the dramatic changes to this project, and because of City Hall's never-ending string of unmet timelines and unfulfilled promises, we believe it is time for the voters to reclaim what has become a billion-dollar boondoggle. We are calling for a referendum to let voters decide whether to take the toll road out of the park. During the upcoming mayoral election, we will be collecting signatures at polling locations during early voting and on Election Day.

Despite claims to the contrary, our referendum will not slow down this project and will not jeopardize funding. In fact, by moving the toll road, we will be able to begin construction of the park and floodway improvements sooner.

If you believe it's time City Hall lived up to its promises, if you're tired of bait and switch politics, if you want future generations to enjoy a Downtown Trinity Park without a toll road running through it, then join us.

Such statements by Ms. Hunt are inaccurate.

She says that the Miller and Kirk statement about the parkway being four lanes adjacent to the lakes is "not true."

The Balanced Vision Plan, approved by the council in 2003, requires that the parkway be four lanes from Continental Boulevard to U.S. Highway 175. At some point , if traffic demands warrant it, those four lanes may become six lanes. The earliest this could be decided is 2025.

The "high-speed toll road" will have a speed limit of 55 mph.

Many of the statements made in the March 27 letter are false and misleading. For example:

?Ms. Hunt says the Trinity Parkway will extend "500 feet into the park in some places." The most the parkway extends into the park is 300 feet from the toe of the levee. The distance between the toes of the levees is 1,800 feet.

?"Isn't it time we took a look at moving the road out of the park?" Ms. Hunt asks. We did that. It was the purpose of the Balanced Vision Plan. Ms. Miller, using private funds, engaged nationally recognized design consultants (Alex Krieger from Boston and Bill Eager from Seattle) to question every aspect of the Trinity: whether the parkway was needed and whether it could be located somewhere else.

?She says the parkway, as a result of being moved further from the toe of the levee is "significantly reducing our parkland and the size of our lakes." The shift uses about 40 acres of a 950-acre park, less than 5 percent. Preliminary plans indicate that the urban lake's size changes from 83.1 acres to 79 acres, the natural lake changes from 61 acres to 57.9 acres, and the island between the lakes and the river increases from 55.6 acres to 66.5 acres.

?For the parkway, Ms. Hunt says, "the park location is no longer the least expensive." This is not true. The major alternate means of relieving the traffic congestion (widening or double-decking Stemmons Freeway or Industrial Boulevard) are at least $300 million more expensive than the parkway and remain so because we own the right of way between the levees but would have to purchase it for the other alternatives.

?"The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has recently acknowledged that the toll road will indeed flood due to its location in the floodway," she says. The Corps requested that a floodwall be constructed that is 2 feet taller than required to withstand the 100-year flood event. That is being done.

As we talk to our constituents about the Trinity, we are most often asked, "When is it going to happen?" Construction on the Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge and the Audubon Center will begin this month.

We oppose Ms. Hunt's petition drive ? not because we don't trust the voters, but because we do trust the decision they made in 1998. And we have made it even better ? by narrowing the road, enlarging the lakes, and creating trails, wetlands and an island that were not there before.

The petition drive will cause major delays in the project, and detractors do not have a better alternative for the critical transportation component, which also affects our air quality. All our funding partners, including Congress, will hold back funds if the project goes back to the voters.

The entire Trinity Project, including the Great Trinity Forest, is over 10,000 acres. It has the potential to transform Dallas. Homes and businesses in the southern sector and downtown will have flood protection. After decades of trying, we will get our lakes. Economic development along the corridor is already happening. We will have at least two beautiful bridges linking both sides of the river. Our traffic will move. Best of all, we will have a beautiful park that will be treasured by generations to come.