INC NEWS - N&O editorial: last-minute move damages integrity of Triangle road-building decisions

[John Schelp]

Editorial: Off the road
N&O, 12 August 2005

Out of bounds is the official call against State Sen.
Vernon Malone of Wake County. The infraction relates
to Malone's last-minute move, at the behest of a
lobbyist and developers, to get around highway
planners to achieve extension of T.W. Alexander Drive
from Glenwood Avenue to Leesville Road. Though Malone
and former Lt. Gov. Dennis Wicker, the lobbyist,
downplay an estimated $5 million cost to the state,
the maneuver's larger cost would come in such obvious
catering to a special interest plus damage to the
integrity of road-building decisions in the Triangle.
It's easy enough to understand the motivation of
Stratford of North Carolina, a major property owner
along the proposed route, in enlisting Wicker's help.
The prospect of development and added traffic for
existing commercial sites is an alluring one. And it
accounts for the fact that Stratford and some other
property owners are willing to donate most of the
right-of-way for the project. The connector would
serve a sizable number of commuters from North Raleigh
to Research Triangle Park as well. Yet, none of this
justified forcing this item into the state budget in
such a high-handed way.

The provision Malone got inserted in the budget
specifies that the Alexander Drive money come from the
already-inadequate funds allocated to the Triangle
under a legislative equity formula. Earlier the
Department of Transportation had cut more than $300
million in funding for Wake, Durham, Orange and three
other counties in the Department of Transportation's
Division Five. What's a nose bleed of $5 million,
Malone appears to imply, on top of all that
blood-letting?

But a fitting sense of outrage over this nod of
favoritism for the road extension in Wake and Durham
counties came from the Metropolitan Planning
Organization for Durham, Chapel Hill and Carrboro. MPO
members invest many hours in recommending
road-building priorities to the state. Although CAMPO,
their Wake counterpart, last spring endorsed an
Alexander Drive extension, it did so only on the
condition that it be built without taking money from
other local projects. 

It's too bad that Malone allowed himself to get
sidetracked on this project, which sets a poor
precedent when it comes to special-interest influence
in the setting of road priorities. If the extension is
merited, it should come in its own good time.