The Metroplan board of directors, mostly consisting of mayors and county judges in central Arkansas, voted overwhelmingly Wednesday to exempt the Interstate 30 corridor project from a region-wide policy that limits area freeways to six lanes.
RELATED ARTICLE
http://www.arkansas…">Townsell gets director's job at Metroplan
Only one board member, transit Rock Region Metro Executive Director Jarod Varner, voted against the resolution in a voice vote.
Wednesday's vote was the latest in a series of steps in a long approval process for the project, for which the Arkansas Highway and Transportation Department has earmarked up to $630.7 million in state and federal money. Construction is scheduled to start in 2018.
The 6.7-mile project through downtown Little Rock and North Little Rock is undergoing a federally required environmental review that planning officials now say won't be completed until early next year. That review could produce, among other things, a preferred construction alternative or a determination that a more robust environmental review will be needed.
Meanwhile, the Metroplan board will have to amend its long-range transportation plan, called Imagine Central Arkansas, and its transportation improvement plan to add the project to it can qualify for federal funding.
The Greater Little Rock Chamber of Commerce and other downtown civic and business organizations have supported the six-lane-rule waiver and described the I-30 project as overdue in addressing traffic congestion and safety in the heavily traveled corridor.
Grass-roots organizations, however, led by the Coalition of Little Rock Neighborhoods have opposed the project on the grounds that it is too expensive, too massive, unnecessary and a threat to an ongoing downtown revival.
Metroplan staff members recommended approving the waiver although they said the recommendation didn't equate to supporting the Highway Department alternatives for the corridor.
"The complexity of the project requires more flexibility and imagination than the six-lane policy allowed," said Casey Covington, a Metroplan official who guided the board through the project to date.
Wednesday's vote came after Little Rock Mayor Mark Stodola wrote a letter to fellow board members supporting the waiver. In the letter, he said he, North Little Rock Mayor Joe Smith and Pulaski County Judge Barry Hyde supported one of the project alternatives developed by the Highway Department.
Both of the project's main alternatives call for the corridor between Interstate 530 in Little Rock and Interstate 40 in North Little Rock to have either eight through lanes, or six through lanes with two additional lanes in each direction solely for local traffic to serve the downtowns of both cities near the Arkansas River bridge. The bridge would be replaced under the project.
Stodola reiterated before Wednesday's vote that he prefers the alternative that would move the interchange that now serves Second Street, LaHarpe Boulevard and Cantrell Road in Little Rock farther to the south and connect with Fourth and Sixth streets for a "split diamond" interchange that engineers say would better distribute high-volume traffic.
Little Rock has received concessions from the Highway Department giving the city what the mayor said is "an unbelievable park" space created by the elimination of the Second Street interchange.
The Highway Department has also agreed to design frontage roads using boulevardlike features, inspired by a concept that some project opponents developed to transform the corridor into a boulevard, he said. Those features include speeds consistent with city streets and wide, tree-lined sidewalks.
"For me, the bottom line is a split diamond alternative ... is a better option," Stodola said Wednesday. "This is not done. The city will continue to negotiate. This is simply a recognition that the collector-distributor lanes require an exception" to the six-lane Metroplan policy.
Smith said the project's development has been the product of "cooperation and of hard work between the city of Little Rock, the city of North Little Rock and the county, even more so than when we built [Verizon] arena and enlarged the [Statehouse] Convention Center."
"We've met at least once a month for the last three years," Smith said, referring to himself, Stodola and Hyde. "So 36 times that we've sat in a room for two or three hours looking at all of our options.
"Some said earlier that the system has failed. I disagree with them 100 percent. Think back to where we were two years ago and to where we've come in the design, and it's all because of the input we've had from the citizens of central Arkansas. So the system didn't fail. The system worked just like it is designed to work."
Varner said support for the waiver overlooks the "untold hours" the Metroplan board, staff and the Regional Planning Advisory Council, a organization composed of volunteers, spent "developing a vision for central Arkansas."
The council voted 20-3 last week to recommend against approving the waiver.
"Decisions like the one we have before us today will help determine whether or not we achieve that vision," Varner said. "The Imagine Central Arkansas long-range plan limits highway lanes due to our desire to create a balanced transportation network. Allowing an exception ... is not a step toward achieving balance."
Varner said approving the waiver will serve as a "gateway to future roadway widenings and facilitate a pattern of development that does not support effective transit or livability goals outlined in our long-range plans."
All but one of the 10 people who spoke about the project at Wednesday's board meeting opposed the waiver.
Kathy Wells, the president of the Coalition of Little Rock Neighborhoods, said the project "will not work, will cost too much and will hurt our community."
She asked the board to support a more in-depth environmental review, known as an environmental impact statement. The project is now undergoing a less intensive environmental assessment.
"We need answers," Wells said. "This will get us the answers."
Barry Haas, a project opponent who is part of a coalition called Improve 30 Crossing, said any litigation that might arise over the project would center on the environmental review.
Before the meeting, he was one of a dozen protesters outside the building in downtown Little Rock where Metroplan offices are located. The protesters held signs that read: "No waiver," "Save downtown Little Rock" and "Keep the cap."
After the meeting, he said the project isn't yet "ripe" for a lawsuit, but "at this stage it's almost inevitable."
Haas was party to litigation over the environmental review of a Little Rock project to extend Rebsamen Park Road west to create an alternative commuter route for traffic between downtown Little Rock and west Little Rock.
He and other plaintiffs in the lawsuit won, and a November 1992 vote ended the project. The area now is part of the Arkansas River Trail and passes the Big Dam Bridge, a popular route for cyclists, runners and walkers.
Metro on 09/01/2016