Times Editorial : Around the bend
Posted on Sunday, August 24, 2008
An official with the Arkansas Highway and Transportation Department tells us that joint projects between the state and cities usually go very well. In the months to come it will be interesting to see whether efforts to widen Fayetteville's Garland Avenue (Arkansas 112 ) run according to schedule or blow up in everybody's faces.
Although neighbors have been awfully sweet up to this point, we sense the potential for hard feelings in this story.
There are few people who believe Garland Avenue should be left as it is. As the primary route through that part of town and a major connection to Interstate 540, Garland Avenue's traffic overwhelmed the current design years ago. In June, the highway department was up in our corner of the state gathering public comments about the proposed project, and more than a few folks are clearly riled up over an early state design that would widen two-lane Garland Avenue to five lanes. At least one spectator was of the opinion that a couple of traffic signals would just as easily solve things.
Others disagree. According to the state, approximately 15, 700 vehicles traveling in a north-south direction shot through Garland Avenue at North Street in a single 24-hour period. Because those numbers were gathered last April, and because the highway department is interested in doing this project the right way, it's likely that state officials will embark on a detailed analysis of the Garland Avenue project this fall. Such a study would take a number of factors into consideration, including development in the area; up-to-date traffic counts; congestion; and so on.
Perhaps most importantly, the public should understand that the highway department wishes to adequately deal with the driving headaches that exist not just today, but which will also develop over the next 20 years. Readers should find it encouraging that construction isn't scheduled to begin until at least 2010, so time remains to exhaustively debate the positives and negatives of every detail.
It's critical that whatever happens, the plan for Garland should be treated as a comprehensive transportation project. Sure, it's a state highway, but it's also a major city street for this community. And this community has set some priorities that seek to support means of transportation beyond the automobile, such as bike lanes and walking paths. We're hopeful state officials really do respect those community wishes.
Here in Fayetteville, the political situation is clearly leaning in the direction of a three-lane solution to the congestion that often clogs Garland Avenue. Last week Mayor Dan Coody became the latest public official to vocally declare his support of adding only a center turn lane to the mix.
The difficulty of this debate is deciding how one will view Garland Avenue. Is it a residential street that shouldn't be expanded to the detriment of people who live along it, or is it a major arterial into and out of this city ? Frankly, there can be little debate over this designation. It's clearly not a residential street. It's a state highway that has houses along it. The neighbors along Garland have a far different set of goals for the outcome of this debate than someone looking at the more comprehensive needs of this city will have. Millions of local taxpayer dollars and state funding will be spent on whatever takes place there. Those local tax dollars were approved to solve the congestion, period. And the greater Fayetteville public should get whatever kind of road is required to solve the traffic challenges there for many years to come. Otherwise, don't waste the money. Just give it back to the taxpayers.
If the decision is made only to placate the neighbors along that route and the result is inadequate for the next 20-30 years, the money voters citywide approved shouldn't be used on the project at all because they won't be getting what they were promised: relief from traffic jams.
Ward 2 Alderman Nancy Allen is right: Laying out as much asphalt as we can does not solve every problem. But we are also sincerely convinced that city and state officials cannot afford to underbuild this project in any way.
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