Estimated Cost of I-94 Expansion From Milwaukee To Illinois Has Doubled Since 2003

Jaws dropped and taxpayers hid their wallets last week when the Wisconsin Department of Transportation pegged the cost of adding a lane and other 'improvements' on I-94 between Mitchell airport and the Illinois border at $1.9 billion.

Our DOT is famous for touting major highway projects as "on time and under budget," but what about "in line with estimates, and reality?"

Not this baby: its projected cost was $942 million in 2003 - - courtesy of the regional planning commission, where the regional freeway expansion and reconstruction scheme was hatched.

Without a financing recommendation.

Now don't get me wrong: $942 million of the public's money isn't chickenfeed, but it is slightly less than half last week's $1.9 billion blockbuster.

Anyone think when all is said and done that $1.9 billion will be final tab? (Gretchen Schuldt tells us why there's no way, here.)

So let me suggest a new slogan for the DOT, where former secretary Chuck Thompson once famously and honestly said the agency's mission was "to let contracts."

The inspiration is WisDOT's $1.9 billion bottom-line to redo one stretch of I-94:

"In The Ground...At Twice The Price!"