You do, if you want to avert downtown gridlock

Editorial

Dallas Morning News Wednesday, August 15, 2007

To hear Angela Hunt tell it, Dallas leaders could easily replace the high-speed Trinity toll road with a slow-moving, scenic parkway. The City Council member who has forced a referendum on the road through the Trinity River Project paints a compelling picture of leisurely drives and Sundays in the park and argues that the planned tollway would tarnish what could be the city's crown jewel.

As she and other opponents prepare for what is sure to be a hard-fought campaign, they now say they're agnostic on the question of whether we even need a new highway.

The toll road, Ms. Hunt contends, wouldn't do much to ease crippling congestion where Interstates 35E and 30 swirl past downtown. In fact, she says, the Project Pegasus redesign of the canyon and mixmaster is the real reliever.

Just one problem: That's not true.

Ms. Hunt is not an engineer. Tim Nesbitt is. And the Texas Department of Transportation project manager says the toll road known as the Trinity Parkway is essential to a plan to keep cars moving past downtown Dallas and beyond.

For a decade, TxDOT has crafted a two-pronged approach to unsnarling traffic through this critical spaghetti bowl of highways. Project Pegasus includes the redesign and reconstruction of the downtown interchange. And the Trinity Parkway provides congestion relief by carrying 90,000 to 100,000 vehicles per day.

The two pieces of the plan are interdependent. Abandoning the parkway isn't an option. "It's like a house of cards," Mr. Nesbitt says.

In fact, without the toll road, funding for Project Pegasus would be jeopardized. Our downtown interchange ranks among the nation's most dangerous and rates an "F" for congestion. With Project Pegasus alone, he says, the area would still get a failing grade for traffic flow.

The federal government isn't inclined to fund freeway improvements that don't actually improve mobility. So without a new reliever route, the Trinity Parkway, the entire project likely would be dead on arrival, Mr. Nesbitt says.

Of course, Ms. Hunt isn't necessarily opposed to building a toll road, but she says it's not her responsibility to identify an alternative.

Luckily, TxDOT has done that, as have a number of city leaders and North Texas Tollway Authority officials. The Industrial Boulevard corridor has emerged as the most viable alternative, if the road were moved.

But with about 250 businesses in the way, Industrial would cost twice as much and take years longer. Eminent domain and other legal battles could stall progress on the toll road – and, by extension, Project Pegasus – and skyrocket costs.

Ms. Hunt says moving the toll road is an easy fix for the Trinity Project, and maybe we don't even need a tollway. Anyway, she says, voters should be shocked to learn the plan they approved nine years ago included a highway.

Again, she isn't shooting straight. Reams of records, campaign materials and news clippings made clear in 1998 that a toll road could be part of the plan. Ten years of transportation studies and documents leave little doubt that the Trinity Parkway is vital to averting gridlock.

Ms. Hunt is within her rights to reopen this debate, but voters should understand what's at stake and what they get with a "Yes" vote.

And without the planned highway, one thing they get is stuck in traffic.

Courtesy of the Dallas Morning News, Wednesday, August 15th 2007 Edition
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