By MICHAEL BURKE
Journal Times | Posted: Saturday, May 3, 2008 12:00 am
YORKVILLE - The state recommends turning Interstate 94 into an eight-lane highway in Racine and Kenosha counties. But union and job-training officials are taking nothing for granted - especially considering recent rumblings from Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett, who is pushing for a six-lane project instead of eight.
To try to head off any momentum in that direction, labor advocates united behind state reps. Cory Mason and Bob Turner Friday morning at the Racine County Convention and Visitors Bureau. In a press conference, they all urged the state and federal governments to stick with the state's recommendation for eight lanes in the future I-94 - not six.
Mason said Barrett's position is making labor advocates nervous about the $1.9 billion I-94 project which is scheduled to begin next year.
On Friday, Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett's office was preparing a letter to the state DOT. Barrett spokeswoman Eileen Force said the letter will argue for building just six lanes and setting aside the $200 difference for mass transit. She said the letter will say that "the money could be better spent for mass transit and getting people off the highways."
It will not specifically ask to direct transit money toward Milwaukee's mass transit crisis, Force said. She also said that Barrett's position is that commuter rail could take care of much of the current traffic volume in I-94.
The state DOT is taking public comment on the project until Monday and will share the results. Robert Gutierrez, the state DOT's freeway chief, said the Federal Highway Administration - which pays at least half the project cost - has not yet authorized the project or its form.
That's the other unnerving fact for eight-lane advocates. Friday, the coalition of eight-lane advocates said the massive project would be a huge employment and also job-training opportunity.
The city of Racine has the state's highest jobless rate among cities, noted Alfonso Gardner of the Racine-Kenosha Economic Inclusion Coalition. "This project will give us an opportunity to create jobs for everyone."
He asked Barrett not to interfere and said, "The best role model for a child is a working parent. The best social program for a parent is a job."
State's largest project
Mason noted that the I-94 project will be the state's largest public works project ever. The eight-lane option, he said, "could be a difference of hundreds of jobs" compared with six lanes.
Turner said, "The four-lane option provides more opportunities for local contractors to bid for part of the work and for local citizens to get training to share in the economic investment of this project."
The I-94 reconstruction, from the Marquette Interchange to the Illinois border, is scheduled for 2009-2016. The 35-mile stretch will be rebuilt, with 17 interchanges reconfigured, and frontage roads in Racine and Kenosha counties rebuilt.
The state Department of Transportation says the roadway, built in the late 1950s, is in dire need of repaving and unable to handle either current or future traffic volumes. The DOT predicts traffic on I-94 will increase between 12 percent and 48 percent during the next 30 years.
A six-lane reconstruction is estimated at $1.7 billion, compared with $1.9 billion for eight lanes.
Standing behind Mason and Turner, both Democrats, during the news conference were about 20 labor union members. Most were wearing gold T-shirts that stated, "Highways For Jobs."
Terrance McGowan, business manager for the International Union of Operating Engineers, cited the federal estimate that every $1 billion spent on building roads creates 47,500 job, directly and indirectly. Using that formula, saving $200 million, or 11 percent, would lose about 9,500 jobs.
"Unless you expand it from three to four lanes (each way)," McGowan said, "you will simply go from an old, congested highway to a new, modern, congested highway with a stagnant local economy."