Call to action issued on Brent Spence Bridge funding

CINCINNATI - When James Hall gets behind the wheel of a big rig for Verst Group Logistics in Richwood, his route usually includes traveling I-75 over the Brent Spence Bridge.

It’s not something he relishes.

“Rush hour is major delays,” he said Tuesday.  “Sometimes it can take a half-hour either direction to get across the bridge.”

Since time is money, Verst Group Logistics President/CEO Paul Verst commissioned a study to see how much bridge delays cost the company.

Verst said he was stunned at the outcome.

“It’s approximately $400,000 per year,” he said.  “That’s the cost of our drivers sitting in traffic along with the diesel fuel involved.”

That’s an expense that Verst said he can’t simply pass along to customers.

“They expect us to eat it unless we can find other ways to reduce costs,” he said.

Those are some of the reasons why Verst joined dozens of other Greater Cincinnati business leaders Tuesday for a forum called “Make Transportation Job #1.”

It was held at the Cincinnati USA Regional Chamber offices Downtown and featured Panelists…

 

• Jerry Wray, Director of the Ohio Department of Transportation
• Janet Kavinoky, Vice-President, U.S. Chamber of Commerce
• Mark Policinski, Executive Director, OKI Regional Council of Governments

 

The focus was trying to find new ways to pay for infrastructure projects like the Brent Spence Bridge replacement, since the federal government isn’t in a position to pay a big share of the $2.4 billion estimate cost.

“It’s not about saying how much federal money can I get and then let’s go scratch up the state and local match,” said Kavinoky.  “The era now is what can we do to make this happen here and then maybe there will be some federal money to complement that.”

One of the reasons for that type of thinking is that Congress still hasn’t reauthorized the federal transportation bill, which expires at the end of March.

Ohio 1st District U.S. Representative Steve Chabot, a Republican, said the last bill was approved in 2005 and eight extensions have been enabled since that time.

“That makes it hard to plan,” he told the group.

Chabot said the problem is the $16 trillion federal deficit and the projected 2012 addition to it of $1.3 billion.

“How do we pay for this?” Chabot asked.

Kavinoky issued a call to action for everyone in Greater Cincinnati to contact their Representatives or Senators and ask them to approve the bill.  That would keep funding flowing for key projects like the Brent Spence Bridge.

Policinski said he hopes the business and non-business communities take the message to heart – that building the bridge is not an option.

“If we don’t, the economy of the region will fail,” he stated.  “It’s very simple.  Congestion will choke us.”

To prove his point, Policinski showed the results of an OKI study on how gridlock will affect the region over the next several decades.

Traveling from to Kings Island will increase from 27 minutes to 137 minutes by 2040 without a new span.  Getting to Florence could take 103 minutes instead of 30.

However, the most startling statistic was that travel from Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport could increase from 30 minutes during rush hour to a two-hour trip.

“What business will want to locate in an area where it takes two hours to go from the airport to the Central Business District?” Policinski wondered aloud.

Public-private partnerships are one idea being discussed.  Another is making the new span a toll bridge.  Design-build options are possible.  Creative thinking is encouraged.

“The system is so broken with the inequity between demands and resources that everything is out-of-the-box,” Policinski added.  “Everything has to be considered.”

One new idea OKI has been pushing for six years is a concept known as RIIZ – Regional Infrastructure Improvement Zones.  That would provide a tax benefit to businesses or individuals who make contributions to build public projects.

“There are hundreds, perhaps thousands, of great projects that sit on the shelf right now because there’s no local match,” Policinski said.  “RIIZs would be a great way of taking private sector dollars and providing public sector local match, which would spring the federal dollars to build these local, very worthwhile projects.”

The same sort of approach will likely be needed to fund the proposed Martin Luther King Avenue interchange from I-71 to improve access to the Uptown area.  That includes the University of Cincinnati, University Hospital and Cincinnati Children’s Hospital.

It also can be applied to plans for the Eastern Transportation Corridor, which includes a commuter rail line and linking Red Bank Expressway with Ohio Route 32 across the Little Miami River.