"I can't drive I-69..."
Posted on 11/10/2005 6:27:08 AM PST by Tolerance Sucks Rocks
‘I-69 is dead’
State, federal officials disagree on status of road
By Matt Whittaker
The Monitor
WESLACO, November 9, 2005 — There are not enough federal dollars for an Interstate highway to the Rio Grande Valley, state officials said Tuesday
“I-69 is dead in the state of Texas,” Texas Transportation Commissioner Ted Houghton told about 75 area city officials and business leaders at a lunch discussion about transportation issues. “The road fairy has been shot.”
But federal lawmakers said the project to create an Interstate linking major commercial centers in Mexico, the United States and Canada is still alive and is reaching a point where it’s time for Texas to carry its share.
The state is considering a Trans-Texas Corridor, separate from the Interstate system, that would be built by the private sector and paid for through tolls.
Interstate 69, a 1,600-mile highway connecting the three North American Free Trade Agreement countries, would have to be paid for by Washington and the eight states involved in the project. The Interstate would extend from South Texas to eastern Michigan. But its completion isn’t likely, according to Texas officials.
The initial study area for the Trans-Texas Corridor is roughly 1,000 miles long. Routes under consideration in South Texas include U.S. 59, U.S. 281 and U.S. 77. The Valley is the only metropolitan area in the state without direct access to an Interstate highway.
The state corridor could enter near Texarkana and end up somewhere in the Valley, Houghton said. In January, the Texas Department of Transportation could begin searching for engineers and exploring route locations and environmental impacts, he said.
Waiting for federal funds is futile, said Houghton, who is one of four commissioners on the Texas Transportation Commission, which oversees TxDOT. Gov. Rick Perry appointed Houghton to the commission in December 2003.
A spokesman for Perry, Robert Black, said the expectation that Washington might spend as much as $7 billion for the I-69 system inside the state is unrealistic.
“From our perspectives, we agree with the commissioner,” Black said.
The federal and Texas governments don’t have the money for an I-69 system, he said. The state isn’t getting enough federal dollars to maintain the systems it already has.
But that doesn’t mean the concept of running a major roadway to the Valley is dead, Black said. The Trans-Texas Corridor would be one option.
“If we want to make I-69 a reality, then we’re going to have to look at a number of other tools,” he said. Possibilities include tolls.
But some of Texas’ lawmakers in Washington disagreed with the state officials about the status of I-69.
“The project’s not dead,” said Ciaran Clayton, a spokeswoman for U.S. Rep. Rubén Hinojosa, D-Mercedes. “It’s going a lot slower than we’d like.”
Some of the project within Texas is already happening, such as the widening of U.S. 281 to make it Interstate compatible, she said.
A $300 billion highway bill approved by Congress in July carved out $50 million for studies on the I-69 project. The money is on top of more than $20 million from the previous three years.
Once environmental studies are finished, the state will know where the highway is going to go. Then Hinojosa would work with other lawmakers to determine when construction would start and find the money for it, Clayton said,
The highway bill increases Texas’ rate of return on gas tax dollars sent to Washington from 90.5 percent under the previous highway bill to 92 percent by 2008. The new reimbursement rate will increase Texas’ share of highway funding to $2.89 billion.
Now that more federal transportation dollars are flowing to Texas, “at this point the state needs to decide whether I-69 is a top priority,” said Chris Paulitz, a spokesman for U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas.
“For decades, TxDOT has shortchanged the Valley,” U.S. Rep. Lloyd Doggett, D-Austin, said in an e-mailed statement. “The resources that should have gone to construct an expressway connecting us to the rest of the state went instead to Dallas, Houston and elsewhere. Since TxDOT will receive a significant increase in federal funding from the new transportation bill, the question for I-69 should be not where’s the funeral but when is the ribbon cutting."
Houghton blamed federally funded transportation projects in Alaska and Massachusetts for the lack of money for the I-69 project, but some in Washington say most of the money was never really expected to come from Congressional earmarks.
Funding for state transportation projects could come from several sources, Houghton said, and local communities need to be involved with voicing their transportation needs and creative with ways to fund them.
He mentioned funding could come through tolls, bonds or raising taxes and fees on water, electricity or cable bills.
The Rio Grande Valley Partnership, a chamber of commerce for the Valley, and the Rio Grande Valley Mobility Task Force, a lobby group, hosted the luncheon.
Texas would benefit from a corridor through the state because it would make it easier to move goods from Mexico and overseas out of the state.
“If you want commerce, you’ve got to move it faster,” he said. “We are going to be the trade corridor for this hemisphere.”
Partnership president and CEO Bill Summers said he was surprised by Houghton’s remarks.
“I don’t think it’s dead, I just think we’ve got to find another source of funding,” he said after the lunch. “It might be dead for a while. The concept of I-69 is not dead.”
Whether funded by the state or federal governments, there will eventually be a major highway connection to the Valley, he said.
“They’re not going to take that dream away from us.”
Posted on Nov 09, 05 | 12:00 am
Why I-69 to Texas???
There are many Interstate routes available to connect Canada to Mexico. I'd extend I-69 down through Evansville, to Memphis, into the Mississippi Delta, through Jackson and to the Mississippi Gulf Coast personally. Most of those areas have no freeways, let alone Interstates.
Gasoline/diesel fuel taxes. The toll booth is at the pump.
That is a dumb proposal. What's wrong with upgrading the current Interstates and creating new connections as opposed to spending hundreds of billions on a redundant pork barrel project?
So taxpayers, as I've said all along.
I have one from between Lansing & Port Huron.. Fraternity thing...
isn't that the only acceptable reason to do it? (same reason for mine :)
I-69 may be dead in Texas, but its alive and well here in Indiana...............
Remember, you're talking about the same pols who threw all that money at Alaska for this: The Gravina Access Project: A Bridge to Nowhere.
Ummm, perhaps you missed it but there would be no tax dollars spent. The highway would be funded by private industry and paid for through tolls charged by the private company.
I'm all for private capitalism, but good, free, public roads are one of the few things government needs to do.
Every time you travel, you spend money and operate the economy, even if you just buy gas. Encouraging travel encourages the economy.
You need to see the result of toll roads like the Turner toll road in Oklahoma, where after 50 years in operation there's practically zero roadside economic development, while the freeways in other areas are crowded with businesses and factories. Same example at the Oklahoma border where the barren Will Rogers turnpike ends, and economic development begins on the freeway. The economic development in the area between Dallas and Ft. Worth didn't really begin until the turnpike between the two cities was opened as freeway.
In Arizona, they've aggressively built freeways around Phoenix in the last 10 years, and it's no coincidence that the city has grown fantastically, and much money made in the private sector.
A century or two ago, many, perhaps most, long overland roads were toll. The old-timers in government bought them up, or built new, free, public roads, and we've seen tremendous development for two centuries. We shouldn't make the mistake of thinking that public roads are the same as public businesses, and should be opposed on some libertarian idealistic reasons. It's not the same thing.
BS. In either case the public pays. The only difference is the collection method.
Building public roads is done through fuel and other taxes, and as such is "hidden" from the public awareness. So actually driving on a freeway is seen as "free", and encourages people to travel and thus spend money and run the economy.
You mean foreigners who will be effectively given emminent domain powers? The same Spanish company that is in bed with Perry to build this TTC already has done some work with toll roads in Canada. Many up there aren't very happy with the result.
I-69 may be dead in Texas, but its alive and well here in Indiana...............
Not at all. An enterprising company within these US could do it
Many up there aren't very happy with the result.
Oh well by all means, let's continue letting the government do it. Heaven knows they've done such a 'wonderful' job over the years
No the difference is where the money ends up. In one case, it disappears into a slush fund and a den of corruption never to be seen again. In the other case, it ends up in the coffers of a private business that uses the money to continue investment, hire employees, and increase the economy within a region
you must have missed I-55 / I-59
I wondered when 666 became 491. Obviously someone had too much free time and had to complain about it.
My point was that in the case of the TTC in Texas, it is not being done by an enterprising american company. I'd have less objections otherwise.
Many up there aren't very happy with the result.
Oh well by all means, let's continue letting the government do it. Heaven knows they've done such a 'wonderful' job over the years
I think the brevity of my response led you to believe that I have an objection to privately funded roads as an issue of principle. That's not really the case. I object strongly to the TTC as I think it is nothing more than a "support Rick Perry's old age" boondoggle than anything else.
This is a huge undertaking that is being done with no real consideration of the opinions of the citizens of Texas. It's something being rammed down our throats by the "united states of north america" wing of government at many levels. Frankly I smell too much graft in the air to support it.
My point regarding the opinions of others who have had dealings with the company what Perry awarded this contract was more to point out possible problems with the "rosy senerio" painted all too often by supporters.
I wouldn't mind seeing some smaller privately funded projects started to assist in building out infrastructure. We can learn better how to do successful projects like this and have them succeed and be boons for all, rather than just jumping in to this huge goliath of a project that is bound to be a recipe for failure and leave Texas taxpayers on the hook for Billions.
You are deluded if you think that private business is devoid of problems and government is completely corrupt. The reality is that both are run by people and people are not perfect.
Should private toll roads become common, I predict we will require the equivalent of the old Railroad commission to regulate the tolls they charge, because each of them will in effect have monopolies over their territory like the old railroads did. Toll roads will not be subject to normal supply and demand price setting as normal businesses are, because once they have the road in place, they can always charge less than a later competitor. And since most locations cannot support two toll roads, guaranteed one will drive the other out of business, and end up with a monopoly.
In the end, you still wind up with government involvement, so you might as well start with it and concentrate your efforts to keep government transparent and honest.
Even without those effects, the positive effect on the economy by free roads is worth whatever corruption that can't be driven out of government.
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