INC NEWS - DOT carrying a grudge? (Herald-Sun letter)

[Caleb Southern]

Pat and all,

1. INC passed a unanimous resolution in support of the East End Connector in
July 2002.

2. It is true that DOT is redistributing transportation money to rural areas
of NC, under their 'equity formula' policy. This results in less
transportation spending planned for the Triangle (and other urban areas in
NC).

However the East End Connector (EEC) is funded by the state Highway Trust
Fund - which is IMMUNE to the state equity formula. Therefore the EEC is not
competing with most other non-trust fund roads in the Triangle for funding.
It comes from a special pot of money.

The truth is that DOT has made an internal political decision to put other
Highway Trust Fund projects in NC ahead of the EEC, despite the fact that
the EEC is the oldest unbuilt highway in the entire state, dating back to
1959.

INC supported the EEC because it will divert cut-through traffic off many
neighborhood streets in Durham.

Thanks to the support of INC and many other neighborhoods, community
organizations, and citizens, the EEC is the top highway priority for the
City and County of Durham and the regional MPO.


Caleb


Ps: I agree with you that it would be good policy to use our projected
transportation spending to constrain our land-use planning. However the
transportation plans are developed based on the land use plans, not the
other way around. This is a classic chicken and egg situation.



-----Original Message-----
From: inc-list-bounces at rtpnet.org [mailto:inc-list-bounces at rtpnet.org] On
Behalf Of pat carstensen
Sent: Monday, April 04, 2005 4:14 PM
To: inc-list at DurhamINC.org
Subject: RE: INC NEWS - DOT carrying a grudge? (Herald-Sun letter)

My understanding is that I-85 cost over-runs (a teeny tiny part of which is 
from noise walls and other mitigation we in Durham asked for, but mostly 
just they mis-budgeted) and similar problems in Wake County meant that we 
spent more than expected in last couple years.  So it is sort of legitimate 
that we get less $$ in next couple years.

My questions are:
* Are there things that are getting built in next 6 years that we need to 
push down -- do we have the right priority list?
* The federal government is (on many fronts) pushing their budget problems 
down to the states.  Last time I was paying attention, federal 
Transportation Bill for next 6 years is pretty generous (it has other 
problems, like "streamlining" on evaluating effects (-:) -- but I think it 
is a good question what $$ we will have after 2012, especially when we were 
already looking at needing to raise funds locally
* It would be real interesting to do an exercise of deciding how much 
transportation $$ we have to spend (including non-road stuff) and use that 
as a constraint to look at our future land use patterns

Regards, Pat Carstensen