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Anybody else going to the public meeting tonight?
February 15
5 to 7 p.m. (presentation at 5:30)
Columbus Health Department
240 Parsons Avenue.
It really sounds like ODOT is coming around with thier latest news release…
The design money includes $10 million for freeway caps and $16 million for reinforced retaining walls that would allow the city to build additional caps now or in the future. ODOT has also offered the city low-interest loans for additional freeway caps and other amenities.
“We are offering an unprecedented opportunity to redesign the urban landscape downtown,” said ODOT Deputy Director Jack Marchbanks. “We can create much wider, safer sidewalks for pedestrians, build more attractive neighborhood gateways and hide portions of the highway below using wider bridge caps similar to I-670.”
Forgot to link to some cool cap renderings too. I LOVE the look of the High st. renderings!
LINK
I’m obviously not as good as Walker at HTML code. :)
No problem. If anyone posts anything good like this to any forum on the site, I have no problem sprucing it up for the front page. Hope there’s lots of good news at the meeting tonight. These cap renderings look GREAT. The one for Long street would be ESSENTIAL to bridging (literally) the gap between downtown and the slowly redeveloping King-Lincoln “District”. If anything it could add some nice retail/dining/entertainment options right next to CSCC and CCAD. Something I’ve thought would be a wise idea for some time now. ;)
Also, there’s an article in tomorrow’s Daily Reporter about 70/71. I’ll post a link up in the morning.
There’s tons of new info on the project website regarding ODOT’s recommendations, so I won’t really focus on that. Most of the Q&A centered around the public wanting caps.
A few thoughts on the meeting:
- ODOT is keenly aware of the public’s desire for caps of some kind. The $10 million set aside for caps will consist of 2-3 widened bridge type caps. They would take, High, Front, or Long and extend it with 75 ft. of greenspace on both sides. This greenspace could be developed at a later date. If the City wanted a more grand “plaza cap”, they’d have to find something like $15-30 million more.
- After learning more about the city’s proposed “grand boulevard” concept, I think that they did a disservice to the project. By submitting a crappy proposal at the 11th hour, they may have pushed the project back by 6 months to 1 year. It really is a bad plan.
- The one way collector/distributor options were the best options proposed. Everyone was in agreement of that, and I personally think that the Mound/Fulton option comes with a few more neighborhood issues.
MELANIE MCINTYRE
Daily Reporter Staff Writer
02/16/2006
The Ohio Department of Transportation and the city of Columbus have reached agreement concerning alternatives for rebuilding the east side of the Interstate 70/71 downtown “split.” However, state and local officials remain divided over the options for rebuilding the south side of the overlapping freeways.
Under the ODOT/city-recommended plan, the department will continue to refine designs for consolidating ramp access and constructing one-way city streets parallel to I-71 along portions of Parsons Avenue and Lester Street, which would connect downtown Columbus and the freeway.
That course of action also calls for several million dollars worth of streetscape improvements, including a freeway cap – similar to Interstate 670 – for the east side.
As for reconstructing the south leg of the overlapping freeways, ODOT is recommending two alternatives that would reconstruct one-way city streets along Livingston/Fulton or Mound/Fulton. Both options would use Lester/Parsons on the east leg.
All the alternatives – and the criteria for evaluating them – were identified through public and community meetings held during the past three-and-a-half years. ODOT used several criteria to compare the alternatives, taking into account how well the alternatives improve safety, accessibility and traffic flow downtown.
Constructability, cost-effectiveness and the alternatives’ ability to minimize environmental impacts and address community goals, such as creating attractive gateways and better pedestrian access, also were considered.
The Livingston/Fulton and Mound/Fulton options received high marks for their ability to improve safety, traffic flow and accessibility into the downtown.
Nonetheless, city and county officials want ODOT to continue studying a third option called the Grand Boulevard, which would build a two-way, eight lane city street system over the westbound lanes of I-70.
That alternative was presented by the city and the Columbus Downtown Development Corp. in July.
“The Grand Boulevard’s lower safety rating, constructability flaws and much higher cost make it difficult for us to advance this option as a credible alternative under the federal environmental process,” said Gordon Proctor, director of ODOT, in a recent letter to the city.
In particular, the constructability of the Grand Boulevard is a significant obstacle to agreement, he said.
“Our analysis shows that the design requires closing off downtown access to build,” he wrote, “which would divert thousands of cars and trucks onto downtown highways and city streets. We do not believe this is acceptable or feasible.”
A coalition consisting of the city, the CDDC, the Franklin County Commissioners, Columbus Chamber of Commerce and The Columbus Partnership sent a letter to Proctor last month reiterating its continued support for the Boulevard as it contend that it is compatible “with our core values of downtown revitalization, neighborhood connectivity and economic development while still meeting transportation and traffic objectives.”
The coalition said the alternative should remain an option for further study for several reasons, including those identified in an independent analysis recently completed about a month ago by Evans, Mechwart, Hambleton & Tilton Inc., a civil engineering firm headquartered in Columbus.
Those reasons include “the need to develop aestethically pleasing gateways to downtown Columbus; the desire to minimize the number of one-way downtown streets to improve livability; a lack of clarity regarding the impact on developing neighborhoods, community facilities and existing housing; and the belief in ‘capping’ as a design solution that knits together neighborhoods and creates economic development opportunities.”
“What we’re asking ODOT to do is take all three of these alternatives to the next level – so they can all be assessed by ODOT – so the city will be able to look into the opportunities available for funding,” said Henry Guzman, public services director for the city of Columbus.
To resolve the dispute, ODOT has offered to hold a Constructability Workshop with state and national construction experts during the second half of March to examine the constructability of the Grand Boulevard, said Michelle May, spokeswoman for the department.
The information gathered there will be used to help decide whether the alternative will advance as a feasible option for the south side. A final decision on the matter is expected by April.
Though the alternatives differ in where they locate new city streets that connect to the freeway, the number of lanes (a maximum of three through lanes v. eight lanes at intersections) and the direction of travel, the alternatives under consideration do have a few things in common.
They untangle the I-70/71 overlap by rebuilding the interchanges at state Route 315 and I-71 and changing the location of travel lanes for each highway.
Further, they all add new through-lanes to accommodate traffic growth and consolidate ramp locations for safety, meaning that after the reconstruction motorists driving through the downtown on I-70 or I-71 will no longer make the lane changes that ODOT blames for current traffic backups and crashes.
In fact, ODOT considers the downtown split one of the most congested, high-crash freeways in the state.
It was designed in the 1950s, and built in the 1960s, to handle a maximum of 125,000 vehicles per day. Today it carries about 175,000 and experiences about 800 crashes per year, or about two crashes daily.
ODOT’s recommended alternatives would cost about $675 million to build. The Grand Boulevard would cost about $100 million more.
ODOT has committed $425 million to rebuild the most crash-prone sections of the highway through 2014.
Under the recommended alternatives, ODOT estimates it could fix 80 percent of the freeway problems by rebuilding the south and east freeway legs.
The $250 million needed to complete the west interchange at state Route 315 could be secured after 2014.
ODOT has committed $37 million in design enhancements – included in the $425 million – to improve the look and livability of downtown Columbus.
“We are offering an unprecedented opportunity to redesign the urban landscape downtown,” said Jack Marchbanks, deputy director of ODOT. “We can create much wider, safer sidewalks for pedestrians, build more attractive neighborhood gateways and hide portions of the highway below using wider bridge caps similar to I-670,” he stated.
The design money includes $10 million for freeway caps and $16 million for reinforced retaining walls that would allow the city to build additional caps now or in the future. ODOT has also offered the city low-interest loans for additional freeway caps and other amenities.
A final plan for the corridor is expected by summer 2006. To review the analysis and make comments, log onto http://www.7071study.org.