Where is DOT money going now.

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My biggest frustration is that building/maintaining the roads dosen't seem to be anywhere on DOT's priority list today.

Case in point: North of Redmond along the south side of 124th crossing the Samamish valley there is a DOT project that is worth driving out to see. They took 12 acres of farmland to create a pritine meandering stream where none existed before. Even imported river rock for the 'river bottom' along with imported tree stumps and carefully sculpted banks. A real work of art. Cost $900,000 for 1000 feet of stream - out of DOT funds. A similar project on the south side of Redmond Town Center - price tag $4 million. Over $5 million dollars per mile they're spending for 'environmental mitigation'!!! I have no idea how many such projects are under way, but I would guess there's a lot more than the two in my area. Are these people crazy??

If you look at the portion of DOT's budget going to salmon restoration, environmental mitigation, walls for noise abatement, bike trails, there's damn little left for road work. And the ONLY road work that gets funded is new HOV lanes. It dosen't matter if we decrease the DOT budget 2% or 20%, or increase it 100%, the roads aren't going to get better until somebody takes a two by four to the bureaucrats in DOT and knocks some common sense into their heads.

-- Wayne (wsmith@precisionimages.com), October 28, 1999

Answers

www.wsdot.wa.gov look at current topics then potential impacts of 695. there is a complete budget breakdown. Fyi, 3/4 of that money is federal as are the environmental mitigation around the state. and the roads will always be in dispare if the cars that use them increase exponentially. just because you build a road once, doesn't mean they will never have to touch it again.

-- ynot (ynot@aol.com), October 28, 1999.

Three words: Endangered Species Act. And it's only going to get worse. These projects are now required for pretty much every road project that even remotely affects a stream or river. On top of that, this is all federally mandated, so it's not like passing 695 will do anything to prevent such projects from taking place.

The reason why there haven't been many new construction projects started? The transportation budget hasn't received an influx of funding for almost a decade. Up until R-49 last year the gas tax provided almost all of the transportation funding, and that funding DOES NOT go up with inflation. So in terms of inflation adjusted dollars, the money available for transportation has been going down for a number of years.

Why just build HOV lanes? Well for one, that isn't the ONLY thing that the DOT is doing, but it certainly is a cheaper way to build for more capacity. In most cases the DOT doesn't have to buy up right of way, and in theory, the lane will transport more people than a costlier general purpose lane would.

But the two projects I am/was looking forward to the most from R-49 are ones that add completely new highways to the region, the 509 and 167 extensions. Of course it's no small coincidence that they happen to be some of the more expensive projects out there at a cost of about $250 million each (again, right of way costs are pretty steep). And of course with that price tag they're on the chopping block should 695 pass.

Just to throw out the real figures too, about a third ($1.2 billion) of the DOT's budget ($3.2 billion) goes towards highway improvements (building new roads and adding to old ones). Pass 695 and roughly HALF of the funding the DOT will lose will come from new highway construction. Yeah, it's a two by four across the head of the DOT, but it ain't going to make things better in terms of traffic congestion.

-- Patrick (patrick1142@yahoo.com), October 28, 1999.


Great. So get rid of prevailing wage laws, privatize transit and other non-essential services, decrease the subsidies to transit and ferries, and take the money saved and apply it against construction and maintenance. Then quit funding ridiculous studies like improving passenger rail service between Oregon and Vancouver BC, and put the money where the passenger miles are, in road improvements.

-- Mark Stilson (mark842@hotmail.com), October 28, 1999.

Patrick, I don't understand. You state "The reason why there haven't been many new construction projects started? The transportation budget hasn't received an influx of funding for almost a decade."

But then you go on to say "Just to throw out the real figures too, about a third ($1.2 billion) of the DOT's budget ($3.2 billion) goes towards highway improvements (building new roads and adding to old ones).".

So, just what do they do with the "current", "not inflation adjusted" 1.2 billion for new roads and adding to old ones.

-- Doug (dgoar14@hotmail.com), October 28, 1999.


Easy answer Doug. R-49. It was designed to pump in several billion dollars from the MVET towards new transportation projects. Although the money is budgeted to go towards these projects it has not yet been put to use. So as of right now the budget numbers of $1.2 billion are correct in that the state will spend that money on road improvements IF 695 doesn't pass. If it does, then that money won't have existed, and therefore, it won't spend it.

-- Patrick (patrick1142@yahoo.com), October 28, 1999.


I am disappointed that nobody answered the question of why DOT wastes $5M/mile or more on nonsense and puts no priority on increasing road capacity. 'ynot' seems to think it dosen't matter because it's mostly 'federal' money. HELLO, the last time I checked that federal money comes from taxpayers also - and they need a two by four worse than Wa DOT, but one thing at a time.

And Patrick says DOT spends 1/3 of its budget ($1.2B) on road maintenance. Does anybody have a problem that DOT spends 2/3 of the budget on 'other than roads'? I don't know what all that covers, but it is of higher priority than roads because Patrick says that the 1/3 for roads will disappear if I-695 passes. Thanks, Patrick for supporting my point that road work is the lowest item on DOT's priority.

Sounds to me like a powerful argument for the people of this state to take control and change things.

Wayne

-- Wayne (wsmith@precisionimages.com), October 30, 1999.


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