Downriver stalemate a lesson for Q-C

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By Tory Brecht | Sunday, June 25, 2006 7:52 PM CDT | () comments

ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH One of the proposals for a new bridge across the Mississippi River in St. Louis would look like the one in the foreground. It would cost $910 million and be partially funded by tolls. Illinois officials are against charging tolls. A meeting earlier this month between Missouri and Illinois transportation chiefs concluded with no decision on funding or which bridge alternative to pursue.

Whether a new Interstate 74 bridge across the Mississippi River will be built sooner rather than later likely hinges on how well backers from Iowa and Illinois cooperate when it comes time to pay for construction.

Even as the I-74 project moves toward final design stages late this year, another two-state interstate bridge project some 260 miles downriver is in peril of being scrapped due to political acrimony and miscommunication.

Political battle

The stalemate between Illinois and Missouri on the fate of a new interstate bridge north of downtown St. Louis could serve as a cautionary tale to bridge planners in the Quad-Cities.

Jerry Blair, director of transportation planning for St. Louis’ East-West Gateway Coordinating Council, said the funding dispute surfaced after the project received $239 million in the 2005 federal transportation bill. What should have been a cause for celebration — St. Louis’ allocation was the largest earmark in the nation — instead brought into sharp relief the large gap in funding for the bridge.

“From the beginning, everybody was assuming when the studies got done, the money would be available,” he said, noting that the estimated cost of the massive bridge and interstate exchange project had inched toward $2 billion. “In 2000, we started warning in our long-range planning that this can’t be financed from existing state revenues, but nobody wanted to pay attention to that issue. Frankly, only about a year or a year-and-a half ago, suddenly people realized that the emperor had no clothes.”

That’s when the two states split on how to scale back the project.

Missouri leaders — from the DOT to the state legislature — favor entering into a public-private partnership and building a toll bridge, costing motorists a minimum $1.50 per trip, at the originally proposed site just upstream from downtown.

That plan makes Illinois politicians furious. They favor a scaled-back $400 million to $500 million plan to add a second truss span to the existing Martin Luther King bridge downtown as an alternative.

“There is a complete and utter lack of respect for Illinois citizens by the authorities in Missouri, and that’s what it is in a nutshell,” said Illinois Sen. Bill Haine, D-Alton. “Illinois has put up tens of millions of dollars, the federal government has made it a megaproject, and Missouri is trying to avoid paying a penny, instead making it a toll. At the moment, I don’t think we’re going to have a new bridge over the Mississippi. It’s dying.”

According to a “situation report” memo updating East-West Gateway Coordinating Council board members, Illinois has committed $210 million toward the project while MoDot has indicated it is unable to commit any additional state resources to the project.

John Baricevic, a circuit court judge from St. Clair County, Ill., and the former bridge task force chairman, said Missouri leaders’ lack of support threatens the economic well-being of the entire St. Louis metro area.

“Three times during this process (Missouri) has increased revenue to its highway department and in none of those instances did they put money aside for the bridge project,” he said. “Missouri won’t put in any money. Most commuter traffic is from Illinois to Missouri, so Missouri would get massive economic impact from the increased traffic, yet we are most of the users, so Illinoisans would be paying for the bridge twice.”

Tom Miller, a spokesman for the Missouri DOT’s St. Louis office, said it is not a lack of will but a lack of cash that led to Missouri seeking a public-private partnership solution.

Despite having the nation’s sixth-largest transportation system under DOT supervision, only seven states spend less per mile on road construction projects, Miller said.

“If we were to pay for this bridge outright, it would totally cannibalize the entire construction budget of the St. Louis metro area for a year and a half or two years,” he said.

Missouri Rep. Neal St. Onge, R-Ballwin, said Missouri does not have the economic clout Illinois has.

“I’m not sure even if Missouri was flush with money, the political will to spend to spend a half-billion dollars in the St. Louis area would be there,” he said. “Funding for these projects — big bridges, road building — is going to have to be more innovative in the future. I think the public-private partnership is a good idea. I’m confident the thing will get done, but it will have to involve tolls.”

Baricevic is not as optimistic.

“I don’t think we’re going to get a bridge,” he said. “I think the project is dying. It takes two states to build a bridge.”

The situation remains unresolved, though the heads of both states’ DOTs met in a closed-door session on June 16 to discuss their differences.

Coming to consensus

Those working on plans for the I-74 bridge are counting on a tradition of cooperation between the states’ transportation departments and congressional delegations to avoid the problems plaguing the St. Louis bridge.

“With I-74, I don’t see there being that type of problem,” said Matt Vanover, a spokesman for the Illinois DOT in Springfield. “They are two totally separate projects. The river crossings themselves are unique and different; the geography and population base are much different.”

Vanover said Iowa DOT is the lead on the I-74 project and has kept Illinois involved at every step.

“We work well with Iowa on the river crossings and we always have,” he said.

Cathy Cutler, a spokeswoman for the Iowa DOT, said funding options are already being considered.

“The big question will be what kind of match we are looking at after the next federal transportation bill,” she said. “But if there was any hesitancy on either state’s part, I don’t think we’d be going on the next step of final design.”

Illinois Sen. Mike Jacobs, D-East Moline, noted Illinois has a different relationship with Iowa than it has with Missouri.

“One thing I would say is that Iowa and Illinois have always shown great cooperation,” he said. “I don’t think we’ll run into those same kind of problems.”

However, planners need to start working out a funding plan now, sooner than later, or problems can arise, Jacobs warned.

“The new bridge is a priority, and we have to pay for it one way or the other,” he said. “It’s an issue we have to start focusing on.”

Funding options

That the $239 million federal earmark the St. Louis bridge project received didn’t come close to covering construction costs is not lost on those planning the I-74 bridge.

The current estimated project cost of the I-74 bridge project is $675 million but will rise with inflation, DOT officials said.

The next federal transportation bill will be completed in 2009 or 2010, but getting construction funding anywhere near that amount is virtually impossible, said Richard Bender, a senior aide to Iowa Sen. Tom Harkin who specializes in transportation issues.

“I think it’s quite possible that through earmarks you could get another $50 to $70 million, but even if you got $300 million, it would still be a huge strain on the two states,” he said.

Bender said a new way of paying for major bridge projects is sorely needed.

Expecting states — especially those with small populations and stretched budgets like Iowa — to come up with hundreds of millions for one-time projects is unrealistic.

“It’s a huge bridge, with a big cost, and as you know the Iowa DOT has been deferring projects because of shortfalls,” Bender said. “The reality is we need a methodology that is going to provide a funding source for bridges like this that make use of our appropriation positions.”

Harkin, as well as his Democratic colleague in the Senate and fellow appropriations committee member Richard Durbin of Illinois, are expected to push hard for expanding the bridge discretionary fund. Bender said the fund has shrunk considerably over the past 20 years.

Harkin’s office has recommended that both state DOTs and local politicians and supporters of the bridge enter into a coalition with officials from other communities across the country which are pursuing bridge projects. This coalition could more effectively lobby for boosting the bridge discretionary fund, Bender said.

The Quad-Cities bridge project does have some good things going for it, including two state DOTs with a history of working well together, congressional delegations that have partnered on many issues and a nearly evenly split metropolitan population.

“I think there’s a reasonable chance we could go to construction in the five-year period after the 2010 transportation bill,” Bender said.

Tory Brecht can be contacted at (563) 383-2329 or tbrecht@qctimes.com