THE FUTURE OF TRANSPORTATION IN UTAH COUNTY
Rep. Mike Morley
Recently, Governor Leavitt held a press conference at Thanksgiving Point announcing the need for transportation planning for Utah County. It comes as no surprise to those of us who travel the highways in this county that the corridor between point of the mountain and Payson is the next area of major concern and bottleneck for Utah’s interstate system.
Budget shortfalls and continuing attempts to raid the Centennial Highway Fund has put the I-15 corridor in jeopardy as well as many other highways throughout the state. This past year, there were many attempts to further deplete the already ravished Centennial Highway Fund for other shortfalls considered to be more critical. Each of these proposals is an attempt to force an additional gas tax or some other source of funding for state roads.
One proposal passed by the legislature allows Utah County, upon a vote of the people, to raise sales tax by 1/4% as have some other counties who have designated for mass transit. This money would be used to improve roads. I opposed this particular method of funding, given the fact that we are already paying our share of taxes for state roads. This would simply serve to fund state roads through an additional county tax and reduce the priority for Utah County roads and move this money to other areas. To me, this appears to be double taxation for Utah County residents for state roads.
That said, something must be done to improve our major corridors. Funding through the Centennial Highway Funds has been designated for improvements to I-15 from 106th South to the Alpine/Highland exit. No money has been set aside or planned for any further expansion of I-15 south of that point. This becomes a grave concern for anyone who has driven that corridor during the commute. Continued growth expected in southern Utah County accentuates the transportation woes of the area.
The continued concern with SR-6 has been somewhat mitigated by UDOT’s plan to make a number of improvements over the next three years including widening much of the road west of Soldier Summit, improving bridges and adding passing lanes between the mouth of Spanish Fork Canyon and Woodside. The ultimate goal is to complete a 4-lane corridor through the canyon and on to Green River. These scheduled improvements have already been funded and will make the highway much safer and will improve the current road considerably.
The state legislature has funded a transportation task force which is designed to study the transportation issues for Utah. There are three representatives from Utah County on the task force who will be very concerned about the I-15 through Utah County which I believe to be the most important future transportation need the state will face over the next decade.
These transportation and funding issues will be studied in depth and will be a major issue of debate in the upcoming legislature.
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