When The Rubber Meets The Road

Will Old Highway 91 be a better, safer road when all the current and planned construction is completed? It better be, we’re spending $12.5 million on it!

But recently the question has become, will it be good enough and safe enough? Or should we spend another million or more to widen about 1 mile of the 3.5-mile road, the portion between Main Street and Kwavasa, to five lanes from the three we’re doing there now?

We don’t have answers yet, but the City will do some research this fall on traffic counts and collect more information to help us figure out what the next step should be. In the meantime, I think there has been some confusion about what work has been committed to and what additional improvements are being considered.

The City has a lot of information on its website, but it doesn’t include everything being discussed. And there has been some confusion about how much of the road would be widened to five lanes and what else would be done.

So here is what is being done, planned, and thought about along with links to the City’s website information about the phases:

• Phase 1: 200E to Kwavasa – This is the work being done now. 3 lanes plus bike lanes on both sides plus roundabouts at 400W and at Kwavasa. Also a multiuse trail (pedestrians/bikes) from 200E to Fire Lake Park.
• Phase 2: Kwavasa to Fire Lake Park – This is planned. Resurface the current 2-lane road and add 7-feet of additional paved shoulder on each side of the roadway for bike lanes.
• Phase “X”: This is a suggestion that needs additional research: Increase the road to 5 lanes between Main Street and Kwavasa.

The proposed “Phase X” is being billed as something that we will likely need some day so doing it now will be less costly. That’s what the traffic study this fall will help us understand better: How important is it to do this now?

There are two problems with doing this sooner than needed: (1) We don’t know if or when we would need it, and (2) Yes, it will cost less to do it today but then we will have to maintain it and 40-50 years down the road we have to replace it – so the longer we delay the less it will actually cost.

The “Phase X” expansion is also being billed as improving safety. But our Public Works Director says it will do the opposite. So does our Police Chief.

Another concern I have is that the city’s current approach to spending money on capital projects is looking at what’s “in the bank” and then finding something to spend it on. The idea for “Phase X” was suggested because we expect to have about $1 million left over in our “capital projects fund.” So our knee-jerk reaction seems to be to spend it on something. We don’t seem to have any discipline or self control, like kids in a candy store!

The problem is there are a lot of capital expenses facing us over the next few years and we have not taken the time and effort to quantify and realistically prioritize them, so we don’t know if we will have enough money for them.  I believe we need to weigh everything together. So, leaving $1 million in the bank is not a bad thing!

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