Transforming two downtown Little Rock streets into state highways to improve the Cantrell Road/Interstate 30 interchange as part of the larger I-30 corridor project isn't a viable option, engineers associated with the effort said Monday night.
Public opposition to using Second Street and Fourth Street to funnel traffic away from and to the interstate has led the Arkansas Highway and Transportation Department to enlist urban planners to help devise an alternative.
"We didn't get a pat on the back for that one," said Jerry Holder, an engineer with Garver LLC who is the program manager for the Highway Department's $1.8 billion Connecting Arkansas Project, of which the I-30 corridor is a part. "You are probably not going to see that go much further."
Under the proposed design, traffic would have been routed off the interstate away from pedestrians crossing at East Markham Street/President Clinton Avenue and LaHarpe Boulevard down a Second Street widened to three lanes for several blocks to State Street before the traffic continued onto LaHarpe. Traffic headed for the interstate would have been directed down Fourth Street from Chester.
Holder made his remarks acknowledging wide opposition to the proposal before about 200 people attending a public meeting the Highway Department held to solicit more feedback on the project that is designed to ease congestion and increase safety in the 6.7-mile corridor through Little Rock and North Little Rock between Interstate 530 and Interstate 40.
The project also includes replacing the I-30 bridge over the Arkansas River and improvements to a section of Interstate 40 between Arkansas 107 and U.S. 67/167 in North Little Rock.
Holder told the crowd that the project engineers will enlist urban planning specialists at a national firm to see whether other alternatives can be developed to solve the issue of traffic transitioning between I-30 and LaHarpe, which westward turns into Cantrell Road.
"We've got a clean slate," Holder said. "We're going to have a new start."
After the meeting, state highway officials said the urban planners are with the national transportation firm HNTB of Kansas City, Mo., which already is aboard the I-30 corridor project. Garver, which is based in North Little Rock, teamed with HNTB in 2013 to submit its winning proposal to manage the Connecting Arkansas Program.
One option that Holder said they might look at again is to have traffic get on and off the interstate on a flyover to LaHarpe that would carry the traffic above the Markham/Clinton and LaHarpe intersection, which is a major pedestrian crossing between the city's popular River Market entertainment district and hotels and businesses just west of the intersection.
Holder and other officials associated with the project, dubbed 30 Crossing, also heard from about two dozen people during the meeting, which lasted almost 21/2 hours and came about two weeks after the state highway officials made a similar presentation to the Little Rock Board of Directors.
Some who spoke praised the planning and community input that has gone into the project, primarily business leaders.
Jay Chesshir, president and chief executive officer of the Little Rock Regional Chamber of Commerce, said his organization commended state highway officials and its consultant engineers "for developing a plan that improves the traffic safety while not materially increasing the existing right of way needed for the corridor.
"We welcome the broad community interest and discussion about what is the best possible design that enhances our downtown business and residential climate but also remembers the needs and safety of the thousands of citizens who commute to work every day into our downtown areas."
The chamber was among the business interests supporting the primary alternative corridor design, which includes six main lanes and, in places, two additional lanes that will serve local traffic getting onto and off of the interstate in the vicinity of the river bridge. The Federal Highway Administration, at the urging of Metroplan, the long-range transportation planning agency for central Arkansas, also required the design team to continue to evaluate an alternative that includes just eight main lanes.
But representatives of community and neighborhood groups continued to press their case against the 10-lane proposal, saying it threatens the renewed residential development that has taken place in downtown Little Rock.
"We believe that most citizens want to keep downtown Little Rock on the path it has begun to be a more walkable, livable neighborhood," said Carol Young of the League of Women Voters of Pulaski County, the latest group to come out against the design. "The 30 Crossings plan does not encourage the city to continue in that direction."
Rebecca Engstrom, a River Market District resident, said the project that primarily helps commuters shouldn't come at the expense of downtown and its residents.
"This is our community, we live here, our quality of life is important in our neighborhoods and our downtown, which we have spent millions to revive," she said. "To have highways covering us downtown or cutting through will destroy our neighborhood and all the effort and the money that has been put into the downtown.
"I appreciate that commuters have a lot of time to spend on the road, but that's their decision," she said. "They've made that option to live elsewhere and to drive into Little Rock, and I don't believe that we should cut up our city and our community to make life easier for commuters. It's our community first, and that's what should be made a priority."
State Sen. Linda Chesterfield, D-Little Rock, said the corridor project isn't just about downtown Little Rock and argued it would help the residents of other small communities in and around the city.
"I do represent a part of downtown Little Rock, but I also represent the hinterlands that nobody seems to remember that also are a part of Little Rock. Southwest Little Rock, East End Little Rock, Fourche Dam Little Rock and all of those individuals have challenges coming into the city of Little Rock.
"So I'm not going to be popular with anybody when I say that living in southwest Little Rock, it's hell to get into the town. It is difficult. I have never had so much difficulty as the other day. It took 50 minutes for me to get here because there was a traffic snafu."
Chesterfield said some people "risk their lives" to go from I-30 to U.S. 67 via I-40. She called the I-30/I-440/I-530 interchange "a confluence waiting for an accident."
"I also would ask you to remember this is about the totality of the corridor and that there are other individuals who need help getting to work. We don't live outside of the city of Little Rock. We, too, are a part of the city of Little Rock, and I would ask that we be given some consideration as well."
Metro on 11/17/2015