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In an effort to share responsibility for this feasibility study with other interested and responsible agencies, we have queried the Park Service of the Department of the Interior only to find that they could not justify allocation of necessary funds for two primary reasons: (1) Construction of additional parking in the downtown area of the City should not proceed while air quality continues in its current degraded level; and (2) any studies of Mall underground parking should not be made until data is available from the use of the fringe parking-shuttle bus service now being operated. This position does not recognize that the automobiles are already with us and garaging them would reduce the congestion of the streets. Nor does the Interior position recognize that the fringe lots with shuttle bases have not been demonstrably effective to date. The present experiment is understood to be limited to the tourist season of the Bicentennial year.

A question about construction difficulties with Tiber Creek running under the Mall was answered by the Secretary by pointing to successful excavations of the Mall for the National Air and Space Museum, the subway, the 9th Street and 12th Street underpasses, and the East Building of the National Gallery of Art.

No source of funding for this underground parking facility is known at this time. The Smithsonian staff plans to look into financing by a joint venture with a private investor and consult with the Kennedy Center and obtain information on the experience of their enterprise