Hooray!!! This will set us up for even more construction that will seem to never end. :carrot: *Of course I do like the last plan in bold the best, though.
Midstate highway projects readied
$294 million in work to be OK'd in August
Monday, June 14, 2004
BY FRANK COZZOLI
Of The Patriot-News
Pennsylvania's 12-year Transportation Plan won't be completed until August, but the major projects planned for the Harrisburg region are all but approved.
On Friday, the Harrisburg Area Transportation Study's technical committee recommended approval of $294 million in projects for 2005 through 2008.
The plan includes:
- $5 million to begin preliminary engineering to widen Interstate 83 from the Eisenhower Interchange to Interstate 81.
- $7 million to study and install more Intelligent Highway System technology, such as message boards and closed-circuit television, around the beltway.
- $2.5 million to expand the intersection of Paxton and Cameron streets in downtown Harrisburg.
The Transportation Improvement Program was developed over 11 months by HATS' planning staff and the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation.
HATS' Coordinating Committee is to vote on the program June 25, two days after the public comment period ends. The plan is revised every two years.
The updated plan is to be approved Aug. 5 when the state Transportation Commission meets in Johnstown. It is $57 million leaner than the current transportation plan.
The reduced spending can be traced to the lack of a federal transportation bill and any funding it would include, said Terry Adams, planning and programming coordinator for PennDOT's District 8 office.
Some projects are close to construction, including the $85.8 million job to revamp and widen the interchange of routes 15 and 581 on the West Shore.
That work, which includes a diamond interchange for Route 15 at Zimmerman Drive in Lower Allen Twp., is to begin in 2006.
The program also includes maintenance on 38 bridges, Adams said.
The plan to build a full interchange for Route 581 at Trindle and St. John's Church roads in Hampden Twp has been delayed.
Because of funding constraints, preliminary engineering on the project won't begin until 2007, Adams said.
The project would add an on-ramp from Trindle Road to Route 581 west, and an off-ramp from Route 581 east.
Planning was made tougher by the absence of a federal transportation bill, officials said. The latest one, the Transportation Equity Act -- 21st Century, expired last fall.
That forced planners to estimate how much money the region could expect to receive during the next four years. Adams said modest increases are expected.
So far, public involvement has been lacking. Thursday night, no one showed up during an open house at the Cumberland County Planning Commission office.
Kirk Stoner, director of the planning commission, questioned how that could happen in a county where transportation is a hot-button issue.
That meeting, and three others for this week, were advertised in the legal ads of The Patriot-News. Stoner suggested taking additional steps to notify the public to get them to the open houses.
"Let's just not meet a bureaucratic requirement; let's do it right," Stoner said.
Any public comments will be attached to the plan when it is presented to the Coordinating Committee.