Indiana offers $6.1 million to New Albany to take over Grant Line route to downtown.
I don’t have a lot of time right now, and this deserves a lengthy consideration.
Though this is only 4.5 miles of roadway, it is probably the most heavily traveled stretch of highway in New Albany. It includes four major arteries stretching from State at Main to Mt. Tabor Road at Grant Line Road.
The $6.1 million does not include new paving for the route
that carries the most Non-Interstate traffic in the city. It is a primary route to the city’s premier park (Sam Peden Community Park), one of the world’s best beer pubs, three primary and secondary schools, the school administration office, the Ohio River Greenway, Horseshoe Casino, and more.
The Daniels Plan is to devolve the responsibility for maintaining (and policing) this highway to the city of New Albany. The state (INDOT) says that the $6.1 million, as an endowment, is more than sufficient to maintain the road. By my reckoning, in today’s market for stable investments, it might earn as little as $161,000 a year.
The .pdf at this site, ftp://ftp.dot.state.fl.us/LTS/CO/Estimates/CPM/summary.pdf, gives some idea of the cost of building and maintaining such a highway in an urban area. Just to maintain the route as it is would cost about a half-million per mile. And the highway needs constant maintenance, not to mention major improvement.
A little arithmetic says that with this money, we could repave a given mile without improvements (or ADA compliance) every 16 years.
I will note that in discussions I had with former Mayor James Garner, he estimated that anything less than a $20 million payout from the state would make it impossible for the city to take over responsibility – and that presumed that the city council could keep its hands off of the endowment.
I invite you to join the discussion. There’s a lot to be discussed.
The NewAlbanist 