Urban loops (Jim Trogdon Ltr to Editor) (Winston Salem Journal)
I’m writing to clarify information regarding NCDOT’s ranking of urban loops (“Beltway betrayal,” Aug. 1).
There are 25 urban loop projects in North Carolina that are candidates for funding from the state. The total cost of all those projects is $8 billion, but the state has only $150 million a year in tax revenues to fund them.
To choose projects for funding, we developed a system for ranking loop projects based on criteria related to needs, benefits and costs. All the loop areas, including Winston-Salem, had input into that process.
It has been suggested that Winston-Salem was treated differently because in other areas we evaluated only segments of a loop, instead of the entire project, lowering the cost factor. That is not the case. The two loop projects in Winston-Salem were evaluated and ranked independently against all 23 other projects. Individual segments of loop projects could not be evaluated separately because the result could have been segments that didn’t connect at either end.
I understand the concern of Forsyth County residents, especially right-of-way property owners. We will work with the community to address those concerns and to identify funding solutions for the area’s transportation needs.
Finally, I’d like to emphasize that this loop-prioritization ranking is a draft document, which will be put out for review by local communities over the coming months before final adoption by the Board of Transportation in mid-2011. We welcome and encourage the public’s input to help us arrive at a final plan.
JIM TROGDON
CHIEF OPERATING OFFICER
N.C. DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION
Raleigh
Published: August 5, 2010
