Posted on 05/06/2016 8:28:33 AM PDT by Tolerance Sucks Rocks
A DOTD project manager has informed a citizen committee that they must limit their discussion to DOTD's selected proposals for the Interstate 49 extension or resign from the committee.
The order, issued in an Tuesday email to the Community Working Group, came from Toby Picard, the engineer who is project manager for the proposed connection of Interstate 49 with U.S. 90 south. There currently are 14 versions of the connection, all of which include at least a partially elevated highway through the heart of Lafayette. These are the only options that are acceptable for discussion by the committee, Picard's email states.
The project "must be a freeway facility" as decided back in 2003 for I-49, his email states. The corridor can't be changed, either, and no idea previously discussed can be re-introduced, his email adds.
Future meetings of the group will be "facilitated" and that facilitator "will make every effort to ensure all CSS group members are given equal opportunity to give input and ask questions during meetings," the email states.
Picard gives a deadline for "input" on the DOTD's concepts of May 15, 2016.
Picard also asks the committee members to "let us know by May 15, 2016 if for any reason you cannot constructively continue to fulfill your CSS Group responsibilities withing these parameters."
Here's the full email sent to the group's members:
(Excerpt) Read more at katc.com ...
Too many acronyms. I don’t understand.
Firstly, what authority gives this ‘manager’ the right to require anyone to resign?
“limit their discussion to DOTD’s selected proposals”
Translation:
“These are the only proposals for which we have arranged kick-backs.”
Translation: Be a rubber stamp or leave.
When we want your opinion we will give it to you.
I'd take that as a signal to start talking about anything and everything involving highways, byways, bypasses, bus passes, bus tires, etc., etc.
Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development (DOTD)
Enough with the acronyms that nobody, except people that work at the DOTD, know what it is.
In any case it should be LDOTD, even then who the hell in the rest of the country would know what that is?
Googling news stories its hard to tell if this is a Louisiana state bureaucrat stomping on what the locals want, or if we have a committee full of utopian nimby’s who are obstructing a freeway because they want one of these bike/pedestrian friendly boulevards that drivers hate.
Can any local Freepers give us some insight.
Looks to me, he's telling the "Kommittee" it's time to $#!t or get off the pot. There are no tunnels in their options. He and his backers do not want to repeat the financial disaster that befell Boston in its "Big Dig."
After reading the original e-mail, this appears to be a combination of very poor reporting and a project manager that does not have a clue how to deal with people.
From what I can gather, certain aspects of the project were directed by the legislation that authorized the freeway, or were already been decided. Such as the alignment.
The project manager may be frustrated by the committee re-visiting “old business.”
However, this is hardly the way to handle this matter. He comes across as a petty dictator. If the committee is revisiting old business, he should find out why and address that. Convince them to move on, rather than “order” them. He p——d someone off enough they went to the media. Stupid move.
Can any local Freepers give us some insight.
From what I understand it is the latter.
2003?.....................and they are still arguing over the DESIGN?........................
I 49 is a federal highway. The plans are as is, they won’t be changed.
I live on the north end of this hurricane evacuation route. The stink when it was being built was the black side of town demanded it be routed through the ghetto and property to be bought out at a premium price.
The citizen committee demands something. It has very little to do with the highway itself and everything to do with hand greasing.
“I think it’s foolish,” said CWG member Eddie Cazayoux, a well-known local architect who once headed the University of Louisiana at Lafayette’s School of Architecture and who has graduate degrees in urban design and city planning.
Arceneaux said he is hopeful a modern boulevard, which other cities have built in recent years after tearing down elevated highways, will be considered either in the context of the Connector project or as the focus of a new proposal.
My town does this all the time. Some larger leftist hellhole implements one of these boondoggles and the leftists in the small time cities want to emulate it.
Did not notice at first that it was you on this thread. :)
Some highway projects can take 20 years or longer to complete.
The I-69 extension in Indiana (I-69 Section of Independent Utility (SIU) 3 from I-465 at Indianapolis to I-64 at Evansville was proposed in 1998. Sections 1 through 4 are complete.
Section 5 (a 21 mile upgrade of State Road 37 near Bloomington) is under construction.
Section 6 is still in the planning stages and will not be done until 2020.
The Bridge over the Ohio river (SIU 4) to link I-69 in Indiana to the sections of I-69 complete in Kentucky are only in the pre design stages.
http://www.aaroads.com/forum/index.php?topic=4855.2175
Where exactly is this happening? What is DODT?
Us 90 South/ Future I-49 was uprated to interstate standards minus missing traffic control ramps, before 2000 from Raceland, La. to Billeaud, La. Eventually I-49 will connect New Orleans to Kansas City. Lafayette has held up making a decision at least 15 years, as traffic passes through the downtown. Ten miles of mainly existing divided roadway upgraded to connect to the I-49 & I-10 interchange on the north side, to reroute local city traffic.
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