If you build it, they won't necessarily come (if you build it where people and destinations are not present)

One of the biggest problems with "next generation transit systems" -- those built since the 1960s -- is that the link between population and destinations isn't always present. The focus was on construction, not the creation of a system, not a better routing of the line to ensure that ridership would be present. Freeway-based transit systems aren't all that successful.

Former Fairfax County Supervisor and Chairman Audrey Moore's letter to the editor in today's Post ("The Next Stops on the Rail Line to Dulles") makes the same mistake. You can build the system cheaper in the right of way on a freeway (or toll road), but so what, because that doesn't accomplish your objectives of building sustainable ridership.

The letter:

With a single change to wipe out enormous cost escalation [front page, Aug. 29], the Little Dulles Train That Could can get federal funding. Put it back on track to International Drive in Tysons Corner, where public land is available for a station.

It might even be possible to go all the way to Dulles International Airport. With a right of way on the Dulles Access Road, the rail line could be built with available money. Leave to later generations the task of adding a tunnel through Tysons Corner. Magically, problems would disappear: no more traffic jams during construction and no more ridership limitations on federal funding. Let the Little Dulles Train That Could be built.

Building it right is more important than merely building it.