Cap City Savvy

Am I being naive? I hope not, but the sad fact is that this project is almost 4 years behind schedule. I think we reached the “paralysis by analysis” stage way back in 2005.

That said, I’m glad they put the brakes on the project once they realized that city leaders and residents weren’t going to stand for uncapped freeways, or a wider divide. There’s been quite a bit of resentment towards the split since ODOT built that moat separating German Village and Old Towne East from Downtown in the 60’s. It all came to a head in some of the previous public meetings, where the questions about caps never seemed to stop.

I’m optimistic now though. We’ve got a public meeting scheduled where ODOT is promising to “share their recommendations”. I’ve been to a few of the previous meetings and thought they were excellent. It gives you an opportunity to look at big poster boards and pepper ODOT reps with questions about specifics that you can’t glean from the website.

Here’s the information about the meeting (LINK)

ODOT TO SHARE RECOMMENDATIONS FOR FIXING DOWNTOWN “SPLIT”

The Ohio Department of Transportation will hold public meetings in June to share its recommendations for narrowing the two options for rebuilding the Interstate 70/71 “Split” along the south side of downtown Columbus.

ODOT considers the highway one of the most congested, high-crash freeway locations in the state. It was built more than 40 years ago, and carries about 175,000 vehicles a day — about 50,000 more than the highway was designed to handle. As a result, the highway experiences about two crashes each day or 800 a year.

For the past six months, the Department has been comparing two alternatives — Mound/Fulton and Livingston/Fulton — to determine which option does a better job of improving safety and travel with fewer negative impacts to the public.

Both alternatives untangle the I-70/71 overlap, consolidate ramps to improve safety, and add lanes to accommodate traffic growth. However, the alternatives differ in how they tie the freeway into the city street network.

On the south side of the freeway, ODOT has proposed reconstructing one-way city streets parallel to the freeway along either Mound/Fulton or Livingston/Fulton to serve east and west traffic into and out of downtown. On the east side along I-71, one-way city streets would be built parallel to the freeway using portions of Parsons and Lester.

WHO:
ODOT representatives, as well as consultants working with the Department to develop solutions, will be on hand to answer questions and record public comments.

WHEN & WHERE:

June 11 and 13
Open House from 5 to 7 p.m.
Columbus Health Department Auditorium
240 Parsons Avenue (corner of Parsons and Main)
Free parking in rear

So get educated about the project on the website, and head over to the public meeting to get involved in your community.