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Highway Expansion - Creating Tomorrows Transportation Problems Today
If Our Goal is to Reduce Vehicle Miles Traveled and take Vehicles off the I-70 Highway, then how does Highway Expansion Help?
THERE IS NO SHORT-TERM, QUICK AND CHEAP FIX FOR THE I-70 MOUNTAIN CORRIDOR.
IT JUST DOESN'T EXIST!
Many political leaders and important state decision makers have yet to realize that the I-70 PEIS selected solution cannot and will not be implemented tomorrow. It is a physical impossibility due to the elevation, weather, remoteness and challenging terrain. Any solution will take years to implement with highway expansion in the 10 to 15 year range!
The PEIS process is selecting a solution to be implemented by 2025, however most relevant decision makers are looking to a 2004 highway expansion solution for a 2025 problem.
These decision makers immediately expect that Colorado automobile travel demand will be growing exponentially and continue to discount any current global trends that contradict this assumption. Climate change, our national changing demographics, the war in Iraq, continued political instability in the Middle East and world peak oil production (likely to occur between 2010 and 2014) are not even on their radar screens. They expect that we will be driving as we do today, forever and that more lanes are the only answer.
Instead of designing our future to accommodate people, they are designing our future to accommodate more cars and trucks. In essence, cars have become more important than people in our land use and transportation planning process.
National studies confirm that expanding roadway capacity in any major transportation corridor simply provides an incentive for those travelers that were avoiding peak periods, using car pools, or taking alternate routes or alternate modes, to get back into their single occupancy vehicle and drive in the corridor during the peak period until the congestion level quickly reaches where it was prior to the capacity expansion. But still roadway expansion is still the transportation planning norm throughout the state and country which is widely accepted by elected officials and state and federal decision makers.
Due to the rapidly rising cost of energy, motor vehicle fuels and highway construction, and the increasing number of babyboomer seniors living on fixed incomes; continued auto-oriented low density development will eventually run out of gas in the not so distant future. Colorado should begin planning for better transportation and land use alternatives today and stop throwing away tax dollars on highway expansion projects.
Now is the time for Colorado to diversify its transportation investment and position the State more competitively for economic gain in the 21st Century.
In the 21st Century, we will see extensive greenhouse gas restrictions to mitigate global climate change impacts and to protect the world's future. We will also see considerable depletion of the world's oil and gas reserves.
Colorado can and must take actions TODAY to mitigate the impacts of global climate change and natural resource depletion and stop creating more problems for our future generations to solve.
Colorado must be a leader in breaking the United States' addiction to foreign oil and ending our single dimension, highway only transportation philosophy, by investing NOW in renewable energy production and energy efficient rail transportation.
We must have the courage and vision to look beyond the status quo of continued highway expansion and provide our future generations with the opportunity for prosperity in a very challenging global political environment and increasingly competitive global economy.
Now is the time to diversify Colorado's transportation portfolio to meet the State's growing transportation needs and give the people of Colorado a Travel Choice. The entrenched highway culture within the CDOT organization is a flashback to the 1950-1960's era when the Interstate Highway System Concept was new and exciting.
HOW WELL ARE WE PLANNING TODAY?
Are Economic Development and High Country Preservation Compatible Goals?
What do we want our Mountain Communities to Look like 50 Years from now?
How Crowded are our Popular High Country Destinations Already?
How Much Mountain Corridor Growth Can Colorado Sustain?
How Much Mountain Corridor Growth do the People of Colorado Want?
Where will the Water and Other Infrastructure Come From to Sustain our Projected Mountain Corridor Growth Patterns?
Is Overuse of Our Public Lands and the Resulting Degradation of Colorado’s High Country Desirable?
What is the Value of Protecting Colorado’s High Country for Future Generations to Enjoy?
What Role Does Transportation Play in SMARTGROWTH and Sustainable Growth Management Practices for the Mountain Corridor?
Perhaps Some Degree of Travel Suppression in the Mountain Corridor is Desirable
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