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Arkansas proposal targets little-used roads

Started by bugo, March 25, 2015, 12:00:47 AM

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bugo

The Arkansas Highway and Transportation Department, frustrated in finding new revenue for road maintenance earlier in the session of the Arkansas Legislature, now wants authority to shed little-used highways from the 16,000-mile system because without new money, it says, it no longer can afford to maintain all the roads.

House Bill 1781 by Rep. Prissy Hickerson, R-Texarkana, would allow the agency to eliminate highways from the system that terminate on one end without connection to another state highway or have an average daily traffic of fewer than 2,000 vehicles and are principally used for local traffic.

A top department official, Randy Ort, said the agency didn't have an exact mileage of the highways that would qualify, but he estimated the total mileage that would be eligible to be considered for elimination if the bill became law would amount to "several thousand."

The system is the 12th-largest in the nation, amounts to about 16 percent of all public roads in the state and carries about 76 percent of the state's traffic. Highway officials also routinely point out the state's combined federal and state funding per mile ranks 44th.

Legislators have repeatedly suggested the system is too large, Ort said. "We get asked all the time, "˜Why don't you do something about it?' Well, this [bill] gives them a chance to debate it."

But the bill has alarmed the Association of Arkansas Counties. The state's 75 counties already are responsible for maintaining nearly 69,000 miles of county roads though they carry less than 10 percent of total traffic. County officials fear they will be responsible for maintaining the roads the department discards.

"It gives us grave concern,"  said Chris Villines, the association's executive director. "It would essentially drop several thousand miles of highways on counties to take care of. We don't have the financial wherewithal to take care of the roads we have now."

The counties generally receive 15 percent of every state dollar devoted to roads with cities receiving an equal 15 percent and the state receiving the balance.

Hickerson's bill doesn't specify who would be responsible for the maintenance of any highways the Highway Department sheds.

"Would they be a county road or a road in a county?"  Ort said. "I don't know."

But Villines said that for all practical purposes, they would be county roads. "There would be some level of expectation that these roads would be maintained"  by the counties, he said.

Several years ago, the Highway Department began apportioning much of its resources to about 8,000 miles of highway under a grouping it called the Arkansas Primary Highway Network. It is so named because, although it accounts for half the highway system, it carries about 90 percent of the traffic.

Ort said he knew of no other similar effort in Arkansas in "modern times"  to systematically reduce the highway system that falls under the department's responsibility. But the subject has been broached in the recent past.

The Blue Ribbon Committee on Highway Finance's 2010 report, which concluded that the existing way of funding highways in Arkansas was unsustainable, recommended, among other things, a study on shrinking the system and that a cap on state mileage should be proposed to reduce the mileage to its "strategic core."

"The purpose of the state highway system is to connect the state – both destinations within the state and the state with the nation,"  the report said. "It is not to move people around within those destinations.

"However, the gradual accretion of old state highways within cities that now function as urban arterial roadways and low-volume rural highways burden the state highway system to such a degree that it does not have the resources to make needed strategic investments."

Until now, the Highway Department has sought out additional revenue. Traditional revenue, primarily fuel taxes, hasn't kept up with demands on the system, officials said. More fuel-efficient vehicles allow them to go farther on less fuel, leaving the department with roads that continue to wear out but with less money to fix them.

Two other voter-approved initiatives totaling $3 billion

– one to repair interstates and another to widen key highways – are stopgap measures that state highway officials say don't address the long-term structural weakness of highway funding.

Earlier in this legislative session, highway officials pushed for a measure that would have shifted $2.8 billion in general revenue over 10 years to highways.

The proposal drew opposition from education and social-service interests that rely on general revenue.

Only a portion of money that is over and above funds generated in the previous year would have been shifted to highways, proponents said. Thus, they said, the base general revenue being collected now would be preserved, and general-revenue growth would be available to other agencies and providers.

Under the proposal, the traditional split of highway money would be used with 70 percent going to the Highway Department and the remainder divided evenly between city and county road departments.

Counties didn't support the bill, citing concerns with language governing how revenue from the severance tax on natural gas would be spent. Some counties in the Fayetteville Shale production area rely on a portion of that revenue.

Gov. Asa Hutchinson persuaded the sponsor to withdraw the bill. The governor said he would form a working group to develop recommendations on long-term highway funding.

In an interview last week, Hickerson said she planned to present the bill at Tuesday's meeting of the House Public Transportation Committee, but she said she was unsure of what would happen after that, suggesting the bill would serve as a way to "start the debate."  Hickerson is the committee chairman and a former member of the Arkansas Highway Commission.

Some of the roads in the state highway system used to be county roads. Until the early 1970s, counties periodically were allowed to turn over a certain portion of their roads to the department, Ort said.

That practice may have been responsible for highways such as Arkansas 221. It goes out of Berryville in Carroll County southwest to the Madison County line. In continues in Madison County as a county road. It carries about 1,100 vehicles daily, according to department statistics.

Several state highways in eastern Arkansas terminate at the Mississippi River. Arkansas 120, for instance, goes about 8 miles east from U.S. 61 and ends at the Mississippi County community of O'Donnell Bend just shy of the river. It carries about 250 vehicles a day.

"There's all kinds of things like that that make no sense,"  Ort said.
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What highways do you think will be going bye bye? In  Polk County, both stretches of AR 375, AR 370, and possibly AR 246.

http://www.arkansasonline.com/news/2015/mar/22/proposal-targets-little-usedroads/



NE2

Quote from: bugo on March 25, 2015, 12:00:47 AM
Several state highways in eastern Arkansas terminate at the Mississippi River. Arkansas 120, for instance, goes about 8 miles east from U.S. 61 and ends at the Mississippi County community of O'Donnell Bend just shy of the river. It carries about 250 vehicles a day.
And used to connect to TN 19 via ferry.
pre-1945 Florida route log

I accept and respect your identity as long as it's not dumb shit like "identifying as a vaccinated attack helicopter".

capt.ron

There are a lot of roads that they can cut from the state system. One in particular, AR 320 which runs north from AR 36 and terminates some 3/4 of a mile north of 36. I never understood why that highway was there to begin with. And truncate AR 36 from Georgetown to West Point.

NE2

Quote from: capt.ron on March 25, 2015, 01:16:13 AM
One in particular, AR 320 which runs north from AR 36 and terminates some 3/4 of a mile north of 36. I never understood why that highway was there to begin with.
Probably to serve this hellhole: http://www.argenweb.net/white/history/morris_school_for_boys.htm
pre-1945 Florida route log

I accept and respect your identity as long as it's not dumb shit like "identifying as a vaccinated attack helicopter".

cjk374

Runnin' roads and polishin' rails.

bjrush

If this happens, I will take back every negative thing I have ever said about this legislative session
Woo Pig Sooie

Scott5114

This is something that needs to be done. Unlike most states, Arkansas has a lot of "useless" highways, so this is an easy way to stretch transportation funding. You wouldn't have as great an opportunity to do this in, say, Oklahoma or Kansas.

Missouri should look at trimming the fat the same way by dropping most of the lettered routes.
uncontrollable freak sardine salad chef

bugo

Quote from: NE2 on March 25, 2015, 01:06:18 AM
Quote from: bugo on March 25, 2015, 12:00:47 AM
Several state highways in eastern Arkansas terminate at the Mississippi River. Arkansas 120, for instance, goes about 8 miles east from U.S. 61 and ends at the Mississippi County community of O'Donnell Bend just shy of the river. It carries about 250 vehicles a day.
And used to connect to TN 19 via ferry.

When was the ferry discontinued?

NE2

It appears on the 1936 county map (connecting to the short-lived AR 162 rather than AR 120) and the 1946-55 and 1956-59 county maps, but is missing in 1956-63. 1959 is the last state map to show it.
pre-1945 Florida route log

I accept and respect your identity as long as it's not dumb shit like "identifying as a vaccinated attack helicopter".

robbones

In Crawford County, all state highways except 59, maybe 282 (Van Buren to Dean Springs section) and possibly 162 (Van Buren to Alma) should be decommissioned.

Road Hog

Maybe the solution is to go halfsies with the counties for a period of time and then turn them over after that to ease budgets for the counties.

cbalducc

How useful is Highway 530 between Pine Bluff and northwest of Monticello since there is no I-69 to connect with?

NE2

Quote from: cbalducc on April 06, 2015, 10:10:44 AM
How useful is Highway 530 between Pine Bluff and northwest of Monticello since there is no I-69 to connect with?
Why would I-69 make it any more useful?
pre-1945 Florida route log

I accept and respect your identity as long as it's not dumb shit like "identifying as a vaccinated attack helicopter".

Bobby5280

Quote from: Scott5114You wouldn't have as great an opportunity to do this in, say, Oklahoma or Kansas.

Probably not. But states like Oklahoma, Kansas and many others will have to consider such a thing in the future as population continues to shift away from small rural towns into bigger cities. It costs a lot of money to build a state highway just to provide access to some farm land. There's thousands of bridges on section line roads ODOT has to help fund & maintain; they're not even on any numbered state routes.

Here in Oklahoma some of the state's smallest towns are literally going broke and dying off. Very few young people stick around due to lack of opportunity and sheer boredom. It takes a solid tax base to maintain schools, streets, police, fire dept., etc. That's pretty hard to manage if a lot of the residents are retired and not wealthy. Some towns look more like ghost towns that have fallen into ruin. It seems like once a small town loses its school it's on a fast track to oblivion. Some towns that still have schools are losing the ability to have a police department or pay for things like water & sewer line repairs. There's a lot we take for granted in what keeps a town or city functional and livable.

Scott5114

I imagine in Oklahoma this would take the form of gradual abandonment of spurs to small towns not on the direct routes. (Things like OK-96 or OK-74E.) Otherwise, the state system has a good density of routes that would still make sense if there were fewer small towns.

I think the bridge thing is a political program that happened because of Oklahoma's high rate of structurally deficient bridges. That got a lot of attention ten years ago when the OK-145 bridge over I-35 dropped a chunk of concrete on a Texan driving under it and killed her.
uncontrollable freak sardine salad chef

bugo

Quote from: Bobby5280 on April 09, 2015, 12:13:15 PM
Quote from: Scott5114You wouldn't have as great an opportunity to do this in, say, Oklahoma or Kansas.

Probably not. But states like Oklahoma, Kansas and many others will have to consider such a thing in the future as population continues to shift away from small rural towns into bigger cities. It costs a lot of money to build a state highway just to provide access to some farm land. There's thousands of bridges on section line roads ODOT has to help fund & maintain; they're not even on any numbered state routes.

Here in Oklahoma some of the state's smallest towns are literally going broke and dying off. Very few young people stick around due to lack of opportunity and sheer boredom. It takes a solid tax base to maintain schools, streets, police, fire dept., etc. That's pretty hard to manage if a lot of the residents are retired and not wealthy. Some towns look more like ghost towns that have fallen into ruin. It seems like once a small town loses its school it's on a fast track to oblivion. Some towns that still have schools are losing the ability to have a police department or pay for things like water & sewer line repairs. There's a lot we take for granted in what keeps a town or city functional and livable.

Then there are tiny towns like Tryon (population 448) that have a police department solely for revenue collection purposes.

M86


Scott5114

Quote from: bugo on April 09, 2015, 05:42:15 PM
Quote from: Bobby5280 on April 09, 2015, 12:13:15 PM
Quote from: Scott5114You wouldn't have as great an opportunity to do this in, say, Oklahoma or Kansas.

Probably not. But states like Oklahoma, Kansas and many others will have to consider such a thing in the future as population continues to shift away from small rural towns into bigger cities. It costs a lot of money to build a state highway just to provide access to some farm land. There's thousands of bridges on section line roads ODOT has to help fund & maintain; they're not even on any numbered state routes.

Here in Oklahoma some of the state's smallest towns are literally going broke and dying off. Very few young people stick around due to lack of opportunity and sheer boredom. It takes a solid tax base to maintain schools, streets, police, fire dept., etc. That's pretty hard to manage if a lot of the residents are retired and not wealthy. Some towns look more like ghost towns that have fallen into ruin. It seems like once a small town loses its school it's on a fast track to oblivion. Some towns that still have schools are losing the ability to have a police department or pay for things like water & sewer line repairs. There's a lot we take for granted in what keeps a town or city functional and livable.

Then there are tiny towns like Tryon (population 448) that have a police department solely for revenue collection purposes.
Good luck to them. Oklahoma has an anti-speed-trap law.
uncontrollable freak sardine salad chef

bugo

Quote from: Scott5114 on April 10, 2015, 07:39:49 PM
Quote from: bugo on April 09, 2015, 05:42:15 PM
Quote from: Bobby5280 on April 09, 2015, 12:13:15 PM
Quote from: Scott5114You wouldn't have as great an opportunity to do this in, say, Oklahoma or Kansas.

Probably not. But states like Oklahoma, Kansas and many others will have to consider such a thing in the future as population continues to shift away from small rural towns into bigger cities. It costs a lot of money to build a state highway just to provide access to some farm land. There's thousands of bridges on section line roads ODOT has to help fund & maintain; they're not even on any numbered state routes.

Here in Oklahoma some of the state's smallest towns are literally going broke and dying off. Very few young people stick around due to lack of opportunity and sheer boredom. It takes a solid tax base to maintain schools, streets, police, fire dept., etc. That's pretty hard to manage if a lot of the residents are retired and not wealthy. Some towns look more like ghost towns that have fallen into ruin. It seems like once a small town loses its school it's on a fast track to oblivion. Some towns that still have schools are losing the ability to have a police department or pay for things like water & sewer line repairs. There's a lot we take for granted in what keeps a town or city functional and livable.

Then there are tiny towns like Tryon (population 448) that have a police department solely for revenue collection purposes.
Good luck to them. Oklahoma has an anti-speed-trap law.

They somehow get away with it. And they do write tickets - the speed zone starts on a downhill slope, and it's easy to go over the limit. There's no reason a town that small couldn't be policed by the county sheriff's office, unless crime is rampant.

bjrush

Quote from: M86 on April 10, 2015, 12:49:26 AM
Does anyone know the status of this bill?

I think the bill was withdrawn because they are going to negotiate a way to do this rather than force it with legislation
Woo Pig Sooie



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