Eliminate Confusion on Baldwin Highway Work

Friday, December 02, 2005

BALDWIN COUNTY leaders and officials of the Alabama Department of Transportation don't seem to be communicating about some crucial highway projects.

Recently, on two road projects of importance to the public safety and the economy, Baldwin officials have said one thing and state officials have said something else.

On Nov. 14, Gov. Bob Riley announced that the state had committed an extra $10 million to a planned evacuation route from the Foley Beach Express to Interstate 10. He also said that the county had agreed to put up an additional $3 million, and Orange Beach and the Baldwin County Bridge Co. would put up $500,000 each.


Problem was, that was news to the locals. And since the cost estimate has gone up from a one-time $26 million to $50 million today, without the local money there's a multimillion-dollar gap.

Highway department officials said they meant to tell the county and Orange Beach about the proposal for more local funding, but Gov. Riley thought the deal was done. (At the time of the governor's news conference on the subject, his communications director said the County Commission had given the information to the Transportation Department.)

Such confusion makes Gov. Riley seem uninformed, puts unfair pressure on local leaders who haven't debated about whether they want to commit more money, and leaves the public wondering what's going on. The evacuation route, meanwhile, becomes more important as both Baldwin County's population and the number of hurricanes increase.

Similar misinformation attends the widening of Canal Road to five lanes, from just west of the Foley Beach Express bridge to east of the intersection with Highway 161. The two-lane road is already congested and three developers are lining up large-scale projects involving condominium towers and retail space.

The Orange Beach City Council has wisely negotiated with the developers to get them to cover the cost of widening the sections of Canal Road that their projects will affect. That's excellent public policy: The developers who will benefit the most from the projects -- and who will also contribute to traffic congestion -- will relieve the taxpayers of the burden of upgrading the road. Also, Canal Road will be easier to navigate and hurricane evacuations will be improved.

But Orange Beach leaders thought the work would begin next year. Now the highway department says the work won't begin until late 2009, even though Orange Beach has gotten private parties to pay for a large part of it. The highway department is still trying to obtain rights of way for the 2.2 miles it has to widen itself.

By 2009, at least some parts of the private projects will be operating and the traffic will already be even worse than it is now. The Transportation Department needs to push harder and faster to get the rights of way and take Orange Beach Mayor Steve Russo up on his offer to help with condemnation proceedings, if necessary.

Overall, though, the state needs to make sure that everyone directly affected by a construction project knows where the money is coming from and what the timetable is.

That means announcements of funding that hasn't been secured should not be made. And no one should lose sight of the urgency of getting the work done.