Trinity toll road delay may extend to 2016

By BRAD WATSOn - WFAA-TV - Monday, June 1, 2009
DALLAS - Dallas Mayor Tom Leppert's goal of finishing the Trinity River toll road by 2014 sank Monday with the announcement that the controversial highway won't be done until perhaps 2016, if then.

Design work will stop while the city spends millions of dollars to study and repair the levees.

Approved by voters in 1998, the latest deadline to open the Trinity toll road in 2014 slipped away just like all the others.

"It will be put off into the 2015, 2016 time frame, and that will be the 20-month delay on it," he said.

The city must spend $29 million to study what levee repairs to make after the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers rated the levees flood protection unacceptable.

The Corps found too much erosion, obstacles like trees in the floodway and bridge penetrations in the levees.

The repairs will cost more that the Corps may share. The impact to residential and commercial property owners along the river is immediate.

If the city can't prove to the federal government by early 2011 that the levees are sound or make the repairs then the government will declare Dallas has no flood protection.

"We're saying it’s the prudent thing right now to go ahead get flood insurance when it’s the low rates," Leppert advised property owners.

The delay could push the $1.8-billion toll road past $2 billion.

Critics, like city council member Angela Hunt, said the planned highway between the levees should be dropped from the Trinity project to move ahead with levee and park improvements.

"We've got to untangle these projects so that those projects aren't all delayed by two years because of the delay on the toll road," she said.

But that wouldn't solve the worsening downtown traffic congestion the toll road is to help relieve.

For now, the city and Leppert said they believe the best choice is to press on.

"And we're not going to give up," Leppert said. "There's too much at stake for that.”

Read more on WFAA

Ad airs from group against the Trinity Toll Road

By DAVID SCHECHTER - WFAA-TV - Wednesday, October 31, 2007
You know it's almost election time, when every time you change the channel, you come across yet another political ad.

Yesterday, there was a new Trinity Toll Road ad airing.

It was the first TV ad from the group that is against the toll road.

It attacks the other side's claims that voting against the road will result in higher taxes in Dallas.

"The lobbyist and politicians are not telling the truth about their toll road Trinity Toll Road," we are told.

"According to The Dallas Morning News,they've used suspect statistics as truth to scare us of new taxes and lost funding," the ad continues.

That's unknown.

There are no firm figures on "new taxes" and "lost funding".

Building a toll road in another location, other than the Trinity, would require the city to buy and demolish properties.

That will certainly cost more, but there is no definitive answer on how much.

As for lost funding - TxDOT says the toll road is the centerpiece to redoing the Mixmaster.

Without it, they say, the federal government will not pay for an estimate $1.5 billion in downtown road improvements.

But, it's unknown how that will actually play out.

"Their claims make several leaps and aren't backed up by proof," the ad says.

That's true but again, the cost of building the road in an alternate location is uncertain.

Toll road supporters say it will cost $500 million but they have not been able to itemize that number.

The truth is it could cost more, or less and ultimately it would have to approved by Dallas voters.

"As for those illustrations of the toll road, we've all seen the Dallas Morning News called them 'figments,'" the ad says.

That's true.
Read more on WFAA

The images of a lush and pleasing tollway were produced by the NTTA, which would own and operate the road.

But the NTTA says the images are only an approximation of what the toll road would look like and is subject to change.

That's your reality check

Another letter to Highland Villlge Mayor Costa and Sen. Chris Harris

Dear Mayor Costa and Senator Harris,

Your letter states that "TXDOT has assured me that there is no cause for concern along Highway FM2499. Further, TxDOT has stated there is no need for an Environmental Impact Study [EIS] as a result of the Lancet study being published".

I hope that, as elected officials, you were diligent in your investigation into this very real concern. That you reviewed all the documents TXDOT used in their study to support your above quote and your position that our children will not suffer lung damage do to this Highway. We would all very much like to see these documented studies from TXDOT (Tuesday would be an opportune time) as the only findings we have, through extensive research, support the Lancet study.

Please provide the names of the TXDOT officials you conferred with as they have more information then the Director of Environmental Affairs appears to have. This is from a July 9th letter we received;

In a recent letter from TXDOT, Dianna Noble (Director of Environmental Affairs) provides the following assessment of TXDOT's capability to understand pollution impact on human health. In summary:
1) The EPA tool has limited applicability at the project level
2) The limitations of dispersion models makes it difficult to assess potential health risks
3) Shortcomings in current techniques preclude us from reaching meaningful conclusions about project-specific health impact
4) These limitations do not allow us to accurately predict the risk of potential impacts on the community and public health following the construction of a proposed road

Regards,

Todd Luther

Dallas bridge inspections under way

By JUSTIN FARMER - WFAA-TV - Tuesday, August 7, 2007
DALLAS — State inspectors came to Dallas Tuesday morning to begin a thorough examination of highway bridges.

The collapse of the Interstate 35W bridge in Minneapolis last week has heightened safety awareness across the nation.

With some 6,000 bridges, Dallas County has more than any county in the state. Using a "snooper" crane, a team of three inspectors began examining the State Highway 310 span Tuesday morning.

The bridge, with a steel girder construction dating back to the 1950s, requires an annual inspection. Engineers say the adjacent Interstate 45 bridge, built with concrete, can go two years between inspections.

"Obviously, we're looking for cracks, we're looking for stains, we are looking for shearing," said Texas Department of Transportation spokesman Mark Ball. "If there's pylons on the ground, we're looking to see how much erosion has occurred and if there's been accidents. If there's been an incident we're attempting to see if any damage has occurred to the actual concrete itself."

Of the 50,000 bridges in Texas, only 16 were built using the same construction technique as the one that collapsed in Minnesota. Those structures have already been inspected.
See Video of Justin Farmer's Report