After a political season of government bashing, the timing couldn't be better for the opening of the rebuilt Crosstown Commons.

The $288 million project is an example of what can be accomplished by the design, engineering and construction competence of the Minnesota Department of Transportation and private contractors; by persistent politicians who insisted that the disruption was worth it; and, most important, by Minnesota's taxpayers, who made a wise infrastructure investment.

The need to unweave Interstate 35W and Crosstown Hwy. 62 was obvious to anyone subjected to the stressfully slow rush-hour commutes. How to do it right was a more difficult question. Suburban advocates pushed for an emphasis on cars. City advocates insisted on transit considerations. Both were right. And both were well-served when key legislators stopped the project in its tracks until MnDOT redesigned it to reflect the accomplishment we celebrate today.

The result will be a hybrid of faster driving times and greatly improved transit options on I-35W. Cars will cruise on rebuilt highways that at their widest span 14 lanes. And buses will speed along dynamic shoulder lanes that will also accommodate carpoolers and MnPASS users. These new lanes will facilitate bus rapid transit (BRT) all the way to downtown Minneapolis. And once there, BRT riders will get around much quicker on the recently rebuilt Marquette and Second Avenues.

The success of the project is due in part to what MnDOT Commissioner Tom Sorel calls a "Cadillac" approach to highway construction. The state's busted budget will mean future projects will be more Chevy than Cadillac, as MnDOT turns to a "low-cost, high-benefit" design-and-build approach.

But that doesn't mean it won't be as effective, according to Sorel. "How we make our investments are a reflection of where we are economically," he told the Star Tribune Editorial Board this week. "It's a 'new normal,' where we're not going to go back to where we were three or four years ago. We have to acknowledge that in how we make our decisions in the transportation system."

Lamentable as the new budget realities may be, Sorel is also looking forward to a new transportation focus on "social, economic and environmental sustainability." That's the ethos MnDOT will bring to its next notable project at the I-494/Hwy. 169 interchange.

The Crosstown project already incorporates some of this approach, according to Lee Munnich, a transportation expert who directs the State and Local Policy Program at the Humphrey Institute. "Crosstown is an expensive project, but the conversion of the dynamic shoulder lane is a model of a lower-cost solution. ... To the user, you just see that things work better. Traffic and transit will flow a lot better. This is a new model for Minnesota and other urban areas, and Minnesota might just be a bit ahead of the curve on this."

The transition from a Crosstown-style, big-budget approach to a low-cost, high-benefit one comes amid an even bigger transition, as Gov. Tim Pawlenty yields to either DFLer Mark Dayton or Republican Tom Emmer. Either should give strong consideration to retaining Sorel, who has rebuilt MnDOT's credibility and is capably overseeing the agency's transformation to better reflect the times.