South metro officials give state an earful on roads

Top officials in Scott and Dakota counties are reacting very differently to news of the state's new way of doing business when it comes to building roads.

In Dakota, they worry about major roads falling apart without outside help. In Scott, they are making a much more fundamental complaint: that a shifting emphasis toward transit and the urban core is threatening their plans for growth.

"When you set up an operation that needs a 60-percent subsidy, you will starve everything else that goes on," the Scott County Board's former chairman, Bob Vogel, told state officials late Wednesday, referring to the region's growing system of light rail lines and other transit expansions.

A cadre of staff from the Metropolitan Council and the Minnesota Department of Transportation has been visiting metro-area counties, delivering a blunt message to local officials: the days of building more highways to ease congestion are over.

MnDOT estimates that it will have $6 billion over the next 20 years, far short of the $40 billion it would need to keep expanding the highway system. The key is to wring that last bit of capacity out of the system. That means focusing more on small but strategic projects, managing traffic with technology and pushing for more transit in key corridors.

Arlene McCarthy, the Met Council's transportation chief, told Dakota County Board members: "We're not avoiding expansion. We're just being very strategic."

At Wednesday's session in Shakopee before a large group of officials, Scott commissioner Jon Ulrich praised the agencies for their help in getting stoplights pulled from the intersection of Hwy. 169 and Interstate 494 -- a big headache for Scott commuters. But he warned that growing counties need major road expansions.

McCarthy and Scott McBride, MnDOT's metro engineer, agreed that's a problem. But "the money is just not there," McBride said. What money there is needs to go to the highest-impact projects, including inside-the-Beltway roads.

"A lot of people in our more rural areas will make trips inside the Beltway," McCarthy said . "Those inside don't go out at the same rate." Moreover, she said, growth is happening inside the Beltway. Indeed, latest estimates show growth slowing in suburban counties and accelerating in core counties.

Dakota officials said in their own session that they don't want to see state-owned roads such as Hwy. 3 deteriorate.

More trips inside the Beltway

Commissioners Kathleen Gaylord and Nancy Schouweiler said they're already getting an earful from residents about conditions on the two-lane road that runs north and south through the middle of the county.

MnDOT is resurfacing a portion of Hwy. 3 from Inver Grove Heights to Rosemount this summer, but an expansion to four lanes isn't planned any time soon.

"We have a long way to go before we get to something like that," said McBride. And if that day comes, it's likely that local governments will have to help pay.

"Maybe if a project is important enough to locals," McCarthy said, "they need to be willing to put some money on the table permanently, not with the expectation that they get paid back."