Inroads
Submitted by James on Sat, 09/08/2007 - 11:09am
I've driven my pick-up truck in every county in North Carolina over the past five years, and I have to say: I don't get all the whining and complaining about North Carolina's roads. To hear the road-construction lobby talk, you'd think we were all dealing with two-laned mud-filled ruts and such.
Sure there are improvement and maintenance needs, but compared to some of the other problems our state is facing, I don't put building highways anywhere near the top of the list of investment priorities.
The issue hit me right between the eyes this morning when I read this story about the so-called Highway 17 Association. It's hard to tell who this association is made up of, but it's a safe bet that developers and contractors like Fred Smith are behind it, people who line their pockets when taxpayer dollars get spent on road projects.
A New Bern-based transportation group has asked the state for a special legislative session to discuss funding for U.S. 17 and other state highway projects. Members of the Highway 17 Association see projects on U.S. 17 that need to be funded immediately, said Marc Finlayson, the association’s executive director.
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“About $700 billion in needs are on Highway 17,” Finlayson said Thursday. “About $500 billion is needed to four-lane the two-lane sections and $200 billion to $250 billion is needed to unbottleneck the four-lane sections.”
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Sen. Jean Preston, who represents Craven, Pamlico and Carteret counties, said legislators did not discuss roads and highways during this year’s General Assembly. Preston said she attended the meeting when the association asked for the special session.
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“We’ve neglected the roads now until we’ve gotten into a crisis stage,” she said Thursday. “I think the Highway 17 commission was on target by asking us to get together to address them again. It’s such an overwhelming problem that we wouldn’t be able to address it in a day or two, but it’s a bipartisan agreement we’ll have to address.”
I ask this seriously: are we really in a "crisis stage" with regard to highway construction in North Carolina? Because with all due respect, it seems to me our crises are of a different flavor: the crisis of infant mortality, the crisis of people living without healthcare, the crisis of effectiveness in public education, the crisis in planning for double-digit population growth.
The only difference between my list of crises and the transportation crisis is the fact that CEOs in the sprawl lobby get richer when the government goes into a frenzy of highway construction.
“The longer we wait, the more expensive the projects will become,” he said. “Highway inflation is far outstripping regular inflation. I’ve heard figures as high as 25 percent per year. The way I see it, if they solve the problem for all of North Carolina, it will benefit the Highway 17 needs as an extension of that.”
NOTE: Finlayson was formerly the communications director for Weyerhauser, and now operates a consulting business (without a website) in New Bern.
Some Young Dems Pictures
Once again rudely commenting off topic (though I will venture to agree that North Carolina's children and workers are a greater priority than our roads):
As many of you know today the North Carolina Young Democrats participated in a variety of USO public service projects all across the state. Some of these projects directly providing support to troops and veterans, some were community canvases, and some established relationships with nonprofit veterans organizations. All of these promoted the progressive vision of a military that supports it's service men and women.
I went to the event in Durham. Here are some pictures.
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Learn More about Mr. Leslie Merritt, Toady Extraordinaire
NCDP Photos
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http://twitter.com/Jerimee
More is better
You can post anywhere you want, Dr. J. Our place is your place . . .
:)
Do good. Be nice. Have fun.
Hwy.17
Agree with you about developers but must respectfully disagree about Hwy 17. I grew up in a small town on this highway and have traversed it repeatedly border to border over the last forty years. Hwy 17 in its current configuration is unsafe for personal and commercial traffic.
There is no adequate N-S commercial route east of Hwy.95. This makes N-S shipping to/from ports less viable (e.g. Morehead City and Wilmington).
There are dire economic problems in this area...some of which could be mitigated by a healthier tourism trade. However, visiting the appealing venues in this region is made difficult by one's having to traverse a highway system that is fifty years out of date and is simply dangerous to drive.
When Hwy. 421 was four laned to Boone, it opened that region to many more visitors
and yes, to development (e.g. the growth of Appalachian State). Hwy. 17 is a broken link in the chain of treasures that are waiting to be discovered in our great state.
The inadequacies of this highway would not be acceptable in another region of NC.
I am not surprised that eastern North Carolinians rose up against the OLF. For permanent residents, North Carolina has become a state of three regions: the Piedmont (the haves), the mountains (the have less) and the coastal plain (the have nots). People there just want a level playing field.
Fair enough.
I don't spend much time on 17 . . . maybe this is why.
Do good. Be nice. Have fun.
Depends on where in the Piedmont perhaps as to
... whether you are "have" or "have not".
... as DOT has been playing around with making 501 4 lanes from Roxboro to South Boston, VA for many years. Heading north from Durham, 501 is a sweet drive until you hit Roxboro. That northern link would finish a natural connection with the Trianlge/RTP and our neighbor to the north, and give Person Co. another plus when it comes to economic development. Dollars that might have been aimed at our section of the Piedmont seem to get diverted to widening or fixing some slab of asphalt down RDU way.
I would like those who establish NCDOT priorities to focus on aging sections of infrastructure, like 40-50 year old bridges.
Person County Democrats
Environmental Defense Fund
Cell phones will be to the 21st century what tobacco was to the 20th.
Where it goes is the problem, not how much.
Personally, I've always observed that the real problems with transportation funding in NC is where it goes. Tiny little towns that no one has ever heard of, with population numbers of 4 digits or less, getting bypasses....yet clogged, congested urban areas are way behind. That's just not right at all.