UTA, UDOT Discuss the Future of Transportation, Development in Utah
Mon, 06/29/2009 - 16:55
UTA Trax line in downtown Salt Lake City. Photo courtesy UTA.
Utah transportation experts anticipate that the $240 million from the federal stimulus legislation and the $2.2 billion in bonding approved by the Utah State Legislature will aid in the development of commercial real estate along the Wasatch Front.
Adan Carrillo, public information officer for the Utah Department of Transportation, and John M. Inglish, general manager of the Utah Transit Authority, talked about the future and the importance of transportation in Utah at the International Council of Shopping Centers’ Utah Next Generation program and reception on Thursday at the Market Street Grill in Cottonwood.
With approximately $3 billion set aside for transportation projects in Utah over the next three years, Carrillo believes UDOT has a responsibility to build infrastructure that will support continual development along the Wasatch Front.
“We have never got this much money in our history,” said Carrillo. “The entire state budget was built around UDOT because the governor and the legislature realize the importance of keeping our infrastructure flowing, adding new facilities so we can have more development, can have more shopping centers, residential areas and so forth.”
UDOT has 92 road construction contracts statewide, with more possible due to funds leftover from low bids, Carrillo said. Some of the larger projects mentioned by Carrillo include the expansion of I-15 along the Utah County Corridor, reconstruction of the Mountain View Corridor in the Lehi area and the Southern Parkway in St. George near the St. George Airport.
Already development has followed the construction of a new I-15 interchange at 114th South with the placement of a Wal-Mart and the relocation of Karl Malone Toyota, Carrillo said. A lot more development will follow, he said, greatly benefitting Sandy, South Jordan and Draper.
Similar development outcomes are anticipated with the construction of Pioneer Crossing near Main Street in American Fork. This interchange, Carrillo said, will set the standard for new interchanges across the country.
On the other hand, Utah will be following the standard set worldwide as the Utah Transit Authority moves forward with its public transportation plans.
“We are way behind in the maintenance of our highway network in this country,” said Inglish, who has been working in the transportation industry for more than 35 years. “We have got to invest in our highway network.”
As the crossroads of the West, Inglish believes it is time to invest in the highway network and improve the transit system by getting on track with high speed trains. Inglish hopes Salt Lake City, which has formed an alliance with Denver, Las Vegas and Phoenix, can jump on the high-speed railway train, saying, “We have got to have high speed lines coming to Salt Lake City. We are the crossroads of the West.”
Utah has made and is making steps toward high speed train, beginning with the implementation of TRAX, which has been a tremendously successful innovation, Inglish said. Not only has the light rail helped to improve public transportation, but English said it has allowed the University of Utah to build structures instead of parking lots.
In addition to aiding development, public transportation can play an important role in solving some of the issues facing Utah today, Inglish said. These include energy dependency, global warming, air quality, national security, congestion and the economy, he said.
“Society doesn’t work unless transportation is working,” Inglish said.
Utah has some “great plans” for roads and public transportation in the state, Inglish said. In the next three to five years, UTA will have built more than 170 miles of rail. In its next phase, the transit association will be complementing the rail system with street cars, bus rapid transit, bike ways and pedestrian ways.
“We have had some good planning,” Inglish said. “People often complain about the problem of the highways, and they blame it on bad planning. It is not bad planning. We’ve had extraordinary planning, great planning. What we’ve had is an unwillingness to recognize that plans can’t be built out of thin air, we have to have money.”
More than money, Inglish says UTA also relies on its partnerships with UDOT, municipalities and “everyone we can” to further public transit and to encourage development that will harmonize the system.
Inglish shared with those at the program a number of European transit systems (Bilbao, Spain, Curitiba, Brazil, Vienna, Austria, Karlsruhe, Germany, and Dubai, India) that he believes Utah will use as models for the future of its public transportation.
“We are going to have transit systems that people are really going to begin to use,” Inglish said. “In the next three years or so, we are going to see a massive shift to the use of public transit. It is not a shift that they are even going to notice … (But) it is going to make a big difference over time in the way we grow and develop.”
By Kelly Lux
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