WisDOT will have its hands full convincing angry South Siders that life can go on with a lower bridge and boulevard to replace the Hoan Bridge - - and to avoid a $200 million reconstruction bill, too.
Give WisDOT credit for looking at alternatives, but demerits for bungling Politics 101 - - getting local input early in the game.
Still - - the discussion about alternatives has to be carried out.
$200 million is a lot of money for state taxpayers to fork over, especially if there are alternatives that could free up land for development.
I'd actually prefer a street-level alternative to the Hoan, and I say that as someone who utilizes the Hoan Bridge every day to get to work from my domicile in the SE suburbs.
ReplyDeleteIt'd be nice to see more of Milwaukee's lakefront being utilized in a productive manner, and a street level alternative to the Hoan would certainly do just that.
I posted these questions over at Gretchens place, and I would be interested to know how YOU personally would handle them:
ReplyDelete1. MMSD- Something would have to be done to that facility in order to make it more desirable for potential residential/commercial development ANYWHERE near there.
2. What about the ships that come in and out with things like powered concrete and road salt? Any at grade configuration would need to include bridges high enough to allow them to off load in the port.
3. Truck Traffic; NOBODY can tell me with a straight face that any potential residents are going to want to deal with the almost constant barrage of Dump Trucks hauling salt from August thru March. Especially when you consider that North American Salt supplies Salt to not only S.E and S. Central Wisconsin but to the Northern Half of Illinois as well. Not to Mention Morton salt who supplies a fair amount of salt as well.(Just to give you an idea of how much salt is contained at the port on a yearly basis: In October of 2007 there was 900,000 TONS of product, and by the end of last winter there was NONE, and all that salt leaves 20-25 tons at a time, so that equals a helluva lot of trucks!)
Now that the Marquette is done we trucks can just hop on the Hoan and hit 94W or 43N or South. I have a feeling this will not happen if they decide to go “low and slow” (I love that term Casey!!)
One more thing to keep in mind is that nothing will happen for I’m guessing 15 years or more by the time all the environmental lawsuits etc. wind their way thru the court system….
To Micheal Cheaney;
ReplyDeleteI expect to see serious and creative engineering and planning to address the questions you raise.
I would expect MMSD to be a partner in that effort, among many interested parties.
Funding and revenue will drive the decisions - - costs to the public and revenues that can feed dollars to the public sector.
Taxpayers need all the relief they can get, both on the spending and on the revenue side.
So let's let a smart and respectable process play itself out.