The new interim chief of the Seattle Monorail Project doesn't know yet whether the Green Line will be built but he's got experience.

John Haley Jr. helped get the Las Vegas monorail back on track after it had problems and did the same for a monorail at the Newark Airport, according to the Seattle Monorail Project. He's also held executive positions with the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey as well as Bay Area Rapid Transit in San Francisco.

Haley has been general manager of the Boston transit system, which includes light rail, commuter rail, buses, trolleys, commuter boats and the nation's oldest subway system.

Haley called the Seattle monorail "perhaps the single most important transit system in North America right now."

Haley is employed by Booz Allen Hamilton, an international management consulting firm, which is being paid up to $38,400 a month to advise the Seattle Monorail Project. Haley is contracted until Nov. 30 for his services.

The Seattle Monorail Project can terminate the agreement at any time, said Cleve Stockmeyer, an attorney who is also an elected member of the Seattle Monorail Project's board of directors.

Haley said he is receiving his regular salary from his employer, which was not divulged at a press conference last week.

"This didn't give me a raise," Haley said.

Haley's hiring follows the July 4 resignation of former executive director Joel Horn, who quit after the public and the monorail board of directors rejected his $11 billion, 50-year payment plan for the project.

Haley's mission is to conduct an independent, objective review of the monorail project and recommend a course of action.

"The board has made it clear to me there are no sacred cows," he said. "Everything is on the table."

Haley intends to look closely at the financial plan. He wants to examine the project's "cost drivers" as well as the structure of the contract proposed between the Seattle Monorail Project and Cascadia Monorail Co., the sole bidder on the project.

Monorail planners have been working on a contract that would require the contractor not only to design and build the monorail but operate and maintain the completed system for up to five years. Such design, build, operate and maintain contracts have been in use for the past 12 years on various large projects around the world. The contracting method has proven to speed construction, reduce litigation and weed out "soft" costs, Haley said.

Haley's past experience has shown him some transit systems fail to materialize because of protracted negotiations.

"Some projects never reach the birth canal, if you will, because they are planned to death," he said.

Another fatal problem can be having no clear cut route decided.

The Seattle Monorail Project has already surmounted some of those difficulties, Haley said. Not only has the Green Line route been determined, most of the land for the guideway and stations has been purchased.

The Seattle monorail also has a history of four supporting votes from the public.

Even if it won't cover all expenses, the monorail has at least one dedicated source of revenue, the motor vehicle excise tax.

"Those are the kinds of things that we can build on," Haley said.

Tim St. Clair can be contacted at tstclair@robinsonnews.com or 932-0300.