By Carol Cole-Frowe
OKLAHOMA CITY --?Oklahoma Department of Transportation officials were criticized for their tactics at a Monday press conference at the state Capitol.
The criticism comes from a group that has been promoting a 200-foot shift of the Interstate-40 Crosstown Expressway to preserve the Union Station railyard and central Oklahoma's future intermodal hub opportunities.
Oklahomans for New Transportation Alternatives Coalition or OnTrac held the press conference to respond to recent statements by ODOT director Gary Ridley and to urge Gov. Brad Henry to listen to all sides.
Ridley wrote letters to the mayors of four communities that passed resolutions asking Gov. Brad Henry to convene an independent gubernatorial commission to evaluate rail transportation needs in central Oklahoma. The cities are Norman, Shawnee, Chickasha and El Reno.
Ridley asked the cities to hear an ODOT presentation and reconsider the current Interstate-40 Crosstown alignment.
One city --?Shawnee -- took a vote on whether to rescind their resolution, after a request by Oklahoma Secretary of Transportation Phil Tomlinson, a Shawnee resident. It was turned down by a 5-2 vote of the city commissioners. El Reno and Chickasha are the other cities that passed resolutions, although neither has reconsidered their original vote.
"A lot of hard questions by Shawnee councilmembers and they did not back down," said OnTrac political director Dr. Charles Wesner, a retired Norman dentist.
Ridley wrote in his Oct. 15 letter to Mayor Cindy Rosenthal that modifying the engineering for the Crosstown Expressway would result in a five-to-eight year delay and an additional cost of $240 million to $340 million.
"It will be extremely difficult for the department to guarantee the safe operation of this fracture critical bridge to the year 2020," Ridley wrote.
OnTrac communications director Marion Hutchison questioned Ridley's numbers and time lag and said highway engineers had told them that reengineering the Crosstown to move parts of it about 200 feet to the south and add two rail overpasses would cost about $30 million to $50 million.
"It's going to cost a lot more than $30 million or $40 million to put back in a hub," Hutchison said, if the railyard is destroyed. "All we are asking is that we have an opportunity to discuss this."
He said the change in the Environmental Impact Statement could be accomplished by an amendment and should not have to be redone. Ridley wrote that the the EIS took from 1996 to 2002 to complete.
Hutchison said preserving the railyard was especially important with recent $4 a gallon gasoline prices and ozone restrictions.
OnTrac officials alleged that ODOT had issued "not very veiled threats," against future highway projects in the four cities.
One of the instances cited was ODOT's announcement just before the rail resolution vote by Norman city councilmembers that closing the Lindsey Street interchange could be part of the $108 million Interstate-35 widening project, negatively impacting Norman businesses in that area.
Another option offered by ODOT officials for the Lindsey Street interchange was bisecting the new $19 million Marc Heitz Chevrolet store with an access road.
"We took that as a not very veiled threat," said state Rep. Wallace Collins, D-Norman, OnTrac legislative director. "I think it was the heavy hand of government. We think that's what's going on around the central Oklahoma communities. They're pressuring us to back down."
Ridley had also indicated the Little Flower Church, Wheeler Park, the Latino Community Development Agency and the Neighborhood Services Organization would probably be destroyed if the Crosstown Expressway was relocated.
Hutchison showed maps at the press conference that appeared that all the affected parties would be intact with the adjustment of the highway and said the right-of-way purchased and cleared by ODOT was sufficient.
Garl Latham of Latham Railway Services of Irving, Texas has formerly worked with the Dallas Area Rapid Transit System or DART.
Latham said the Oklahoma City railyard is the nexus of transportation for the state.
This is why it's an issue to well beyond the central Oklahoma area," he said. "We are talking about something that can't be replicated. ... This is a very critical juncture for future transportation planning."
Norman's mayor said Monday evening that they have not heard back from Gov. Henry in response to her Sept. 26 letter that accompanied a copy of Norman's rail resolution passed three days earlier.
Rosenthal said when she received the letter from Ridley she shared it with other councilmembers. She said only one councilmember got back to her on it.
"Nobody has asked that we reconsider," she said of the councilmembers, although the councilmember in question suggested they listen to the ODOT presentation.
She noted that Norman's resolution did not say ODOT had all the facts, nor did OnTrac have all the facts.
"The whole part of the resolution is to bring together all the parties who have relevant facts," she said. "We would like the governor to take one last look at it."
Wesner said ODOT has never taken their proposal seriously.
"And the governor has never seen it. He totally takes ODOT's advice," Wesner said.
Hutchison said work on the Crosstown has been suspended because of a ruling from the Federal Surface Transportation Board that ruled the abandonment of one of the lines going into Union Station had been misrepresented.
ODOT spokeswoman Terri Angier told The Associated Press that a statement from Ridley would be forthcoming.
Carol Cole-Frowe 366-3538 ccole@normantranscript.com
