Duke Response to GoTriangle Regarding Durham-Orange Light Rail Transit Proposal

Duke has declined to participate in further mediation regarding the proposed Durham-Orange Light Rail Transit project. Duke President Vincent E. Price, Chancellor for Health Affairs A. Eugene Washington and Executive Vice President Tallman Trask III wrote in a letter to GoTriangle on Thursday that the proposed DOLRT route along Erwin Road adjacent to the Duke medical center “poses significant and unacceptable risks to the safety of the nearly 1.5 million patients who receive care at our hospital and clinics each year, and the future viability of health care and research at Duke.”
 
The university restated the lack of workable solutions to its longstanding concerns related to the proposed route, and also released the results of an independent assessment of electromagnetic interference and its potential impact on medical devices in patient care and research buildings along the Erwin Road corridor. (See letter and report.)
 
Duke officials concluded, “GoTriangle has created a set of compromises that Duke is simply unwilling to accept. These circumstances, based on facts that we have no reason to believe will change with further review or mediation, will jeopardize community health, public safety and the future viability of our enterprise. Having concluded that your proposed DOLRT route down Erwin Road is simply not workable, we do not see any value in entering into mediation.”

Read the full text of the letter, Memorandum of Understanding and assessment of electromagnetic intereference.