By Adam Coronado
"It's about damn time," said County Commissioner Kevin Wolff of the 281 Superstreet Groundbreaking event on March 11. The audience responded with laughter and applause.
Other speakers, including County Judge Nelson Wolff, Senator Jeff Wentworth (R-TX), Alamo Regional Mobility Authority (ARMA) Chairman William Thornton, and VIA Metropolitan Transit Board Chair Henry Munoz III, echoed the commissioner's sentiments with frequent jokes and a general sense of relief.
"This is for the people," Thornton proclaimed.
The 281 Superstreet is a highway project that reconciles the needs of Stone Oak motorists with the environmental regulations and grant costs preventing 281 from being revamped. Construction will run from March-September between the hours of 9:30 pm and 5:30 am. The Superstreet will not add new lanes, overpasses, on-ramps, or off-ramps on the stretch from 1604 to Marshall Road. Instead, several "turning lanes" will be incorporated at traffic lights to hold motorists bound for the city streets. Meanwhile, motorists entering 281 from city roads will no longer be able to turn left across the highway. Instead, they will always turn right and either merge with traffic or veer into a protected U-turn lane to cross the highway. In both instances, the very cars that often slow traffic will be diverted from 281's main traffic flow.
According to the press kit, the 281 Superstreet will reduce travel times and potential accidents by an estimated 50% while meeting federal criteria for construction without the need for environmental clearance. Notably, the project costs $7.78 M, a fraction of the $43 M in gas tax money raised for a different expansion plan proposed earlier in the decade. The funding is a combination of funds gathered from The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act ($5.7 M), the Advanced Transportation District ($1.6 M), and San Antonio's District 9 ($480,000).
"None of these are borrowed funds," Thornton said, happily. "There are no bonds. There is no debt. It won't affect people's taxes at the county or city level."
However, Art Downey, a member of the ARMA Board of Directors (and who did not address the crowd), emphasized that the Superstreet is an "interim solution," a good short term solution to have while long term solutions are being determined, he said.
"[For] anywhere from 7-10 years, it's going to be a positive influence and then it can choke," he said. "The problem we have with any construction on 281 is that we have to conduct an environmental impact study and it has to be approved before any additional lanes are constructed on 281. The ARMA is sponsoring the environmental impact study."
The fight to relieve congestion along 281 north of 1604 has met several obstacles in the last decade. According to www.411on 281.com, an expansion plan was approved as early as 2001, but fund-raising problems prevented construction from beginning until 2005. Then construction was halted after environmental groups sued. In 2007, Texas made the use of private toll roads to finish raising project money illegal. The same year, the ARMA took control of the 281 highway project and began taking bids and devising plans for construction. In 2008, all environmental clearances for the project were revoked. Now, an environmental impact study must be completed before ARMA, or any other highway authority, embarks on a comprehensive highway project.
"It is hoped to be completed in 2012," Downey said.