What Went Wrong With Anchorage Roads?
(12/15/97)

by Senator Dave Donley

Anchorage motorists are facing ever growing traffic problems because of inaction of city, state and federal bureaucracies and a lack of local, state, and federal leadership.

Anchorage's road improvements have fallen further and further behind demand with inadequate progress being made on plans to address current, let alone future transportation needs.

THE MAJOR INVESTMENT STUDY BOONDOGGLE

How did we get to this point? For the past four years Anchorage transportation advocates have been told by city and state officials that no major new projects could be planned or built until Anchorage completed a Major Investment Study (MIS). We were told that the 1991 federal law (ISTEA), that provides federal money for transportation projects, required cities of over 200,000 to complete a MIS before federal funds could be used for any major new road projects.

Behind this MIS excuse, federal road improvements funds have been diverted away from Anchorage to other parts of the state and planning for new Anchorage projects was virtually frozen. City officials told road advocates nothing could be done until the city completed a MIS and that would take years. Anchorage legislators were told there was nothing they could do to speed the MIS process.

Since 1993 the state capital budget has essentially only contained funding to match available federal funds for transportation projects. Since no state general fund money was available for roads and use of federal funds required an MIS no major new Anchorage projects could be funded.

Seeing Anchorage fall further and further behind in needed road construction, frustrated Anchorage legislators and the Anchorage Assembly asked Congress to repeal the MIS requirement from the federal law. Elected officials were told by the state Department of Transportation (DOT) that Anchorage's best hope was that Congress would remove the MIS requirement. City planners told Anchorage legislators they agreed that was the solution and that they weren't really working that hard to complete an MIS based on the hope Congress would make this change.

Suddenly a bureaucratic change of heart began to occur as Alaska's Congressional delegation began to consider advocating such a change to federal law.

Starting in September of 1997 certain DOT and MOA officials began to imply that maybe there was a way around the MIS requirements. In fact it is beginning to appear like no city officials before 1997 ever even inquired of the federal government about what projects could be begun without an MIS and no one in government had ever thought to request to an exemption as many other communities in the United States have obtained. In the meantime, nothing was being done to solve traffic problems like the Lake Otis and Tudor intersection.

ANCHORAGE FAILED TO FOLLOW ITS LONG RANGE TRANSPORTATION PLAN

In addition to MIS fiasco another reason Anchorage's roads are so far behind was the failure of the city government to follow its own Long Range Transportation Plan (LRTP) or adopt an alternative. The city's current LRTP calls for Bragaw to be extended south to connect Abbott Loop and Dowling to mitigate traffic problems at Lake Otis and Tudor. But Mayor Fink and the Assembly could not agree on whether or not Bragaw should also be put through the University of Alaska campus area to where it currently ends by East High School. This impasse appears to have spilled over into the issue of extending Bragaw south of Tudor. Thus a "catch 22" situation was created. The LRTP solution to the problem at Lake Otis and Tudor was to extend Bragaw south of Tudor but the city government lacked a consensus to do so. At this point the city should have amended the LRTP to seek another solution. Instead of dealing with the issue, unfortunately city government decided to use the MIS requirement as an excuse to ignore the problem and they never amended the city's LRTP. The result was that nothing was accomplished or even planned to solve the problem at Lake Otis and Tudor.

Federal transportation money continued to come to Anchorage for "non major" projects such as re-paving and projects that were planned prior to 1991 when MIS requirements were adopted. Federal law requires that the use of such funds in a city of over 200,000 be prioritized by a local planning organization. In Anchorage the Anchorage Metropolitan Area Transportation Study or AMATS was formed to meet this federal requirement. The Mayor of Anchorage and the Governor signed an AMATS agreement creating a 5 member committee of two Assembly members, the Mayor, and two state members, one from the Department of Transportation (DOT) and one from the Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC). The legislature was not consulted and not given any representation on AMATS even though the legislature must approve all expenditures as part of the state budget process.

In November of 1997 the Anchorage Caucus, a bi-partisan group including all Anchorage state legislators, passed a resolution calling on the Mayor of Anchorage and the Governor to modify the AMATS agreement to add two Anchorage legislators to the committee and delete the DEC member.

ANCHORAGE NOT GIVEN FAIR SHARE OF TRANSPORTATION FUNDING

The Hickel administration decided that Anchorage should get $22 million of the about $125 million of annual federal funds from ISTEA for community transportation projects in Alaska. This funding was divided between "community transportation" funding (about $105 million statewide) and the "TRAKK" program (trails) (about $20.6 statewide). There was no basis in law for this $22 million Anchorage allocation decision and in fact the federal law only set a minimum level for cities like Anchorage of about $4 million annually. Even though Anchorage had 42% of the population and almost half the motor vehicles in the state the Hickel Administration decided to give Anchorage less than 20% of the federal money. The Municipality has apparently never challenged this obviously insufficient and unfair allocation. This $22 million has been prioritized annually by the AMATS committee and has consisted of about $18 million for "community transportation" and about $4.6 million for trails (the "TRAKK" program).

Another $140 million annually of federal funds goes to National Highway System (NHS) projects in Alaska. Some major roads in Anchorage such as the Seward Highway, the Glenn Highway, Minnesota Drive and International Airport Road are part of and receive funding from these NHS funds.

Improvements to these NHS roads in Anchorage area have, since 1991, also been subject to the MIS requirement of ISTEA and AMATS approval. It was believed that major new improvements, for which at least planning had not begun prior to 1991, could not begin until an MIS was completed. Accordingly the state DOT diverted money for needed Anchorage projects to NHS projects in other parts of the state and Anchorage fell further and further behind.

Even when major Anchorage projects were MIS exempt because they had been begun prior to 1991, such as the Minnesota Drive/International Airport Road interchange project, the state DOT ignored Anchorage needs so it could spend NHS funds in other parts of the state.

I believe part of the reason for this was a political bias against Anchorage but also it was because other parts of the state lobbied for, welcomed, and supported new road projects more than the Anchorage public did. In Anchorage when DOT held public hearings on new road projects groups of vocal "no new roads" advocates would oppose virtually any new idea. It was easier for DOT to just not do Anchorage projects and spend road funds in other pro-road communities.

WHAT SHOULD WE DO NOW?

1. GREATER PUBLIC PARTICIPATION IN THE TRANSPORTATION PLANNING PROCESS

Nobody should support building new roads in Anchorage unless they are needed but unless we as a community support needed road projects we have a traffic nightmare in our immediate future. The majority of the public that support good roads, the same folks who overwhelmingly vote to approve municipal road bonds while rejecting most other bonds, need to begin to participate in the transportation planning process. Supporters of better roads for Anchorage need to get organized and be vocal.

Despite repeated requests for public input very few Anchorage residents ever comment on the Municipality's Transportation Improvement Plan, the State's Transportation Improvement Plan, and the Anchorage Metropolitan Area Transportation Study program. When few people take the time to comment the impact of anti-growth and anti-road advocates is much greater.

This past summer DOT asked the public to "nominate" new transportation projects in the Anchorage area. Although any member of the public could do so very few private citizens from Anchorage did. Once nominated such ideas go on a list for evaluation but if no one takes the time to nominate a project it will not even be considered.

2. ORGANIZE ANCHORAGE TRANSPORTATION IMPROVEMENTS ADVOCACY GROUPS

Anchorage has no advocacy group for improving Anchorage roads. In other major communities the local Chamber of Commerce has a committee of some sort to advocate for transportation improvements. The Anchorage Chamber of Commerce has not had such a group. These committees in other communities, especially in Fairbanks, have been very successful in convincing state government to spend transportation funds in their areas at Anchorage's loss.

This summer I asked the Anchorage Chamber of Commerce to form such a committee and its first meeting is scheduled for mid-December 1997.

In the meantime the Fairbanks Chamber of Commerce has recently written a letter to the state demanding more road money for Fairbanks this year. Anyone who has driven in Fairbanks lately knows how excellent their road system is compared to Anchorage and yet Fairbanks is fighting for more while Anchorage does almost nothing.

The last major road improvement push in Anchorage was the "Accelerated Roads Program" of the mid-1980's. Local groups including businesses, unions, and builders formed the "ROADS" committee to lobby the state for road funds for Anchorage. The over $200 million in extra state money they helped obtain made tremendous transportation system progress in Anchorage possible. Now, almost 15 years later, it is time to form such a group to work for Anchorage again.

Without such coordinated advocacy groups Anchorage traffic problems will probably not receive the attention they need and will simply get worse and worse.

3. EDUCATE YOURSELF AND CHALLENGE THE STATUS QUO

For years now Governors have simply continued the practice of allocating Anchorage $22 million of the $125 million available statewide for community transportation projects. Many government officials and members of the public believed that this was an amount established by some federal or state formula. Actually it was just an arbitrary decision by the Governor. It is time Anchorage residents questioned the basis for such unfair and arbitrary funding decisions.

By educating ourselves as to how the system works and challenging the status quo we can influence the political process on the local, state and federal level to obtain fairer treatment for Anchorage.

4. PUT POLITICAL PRESSURE ON ALL ELECTED OFFICIALS FOR FAIR FUNDING FOR ANCHORAGE TRANSPORTATION PROJECTS

Alaska's Congressional delegation, the Governor, the Mayor, Legislators and Assembly members all bear responsibility for Anchorage transportation needs. The public should hold them all accountable and put political pressure on all of them to obtain fair consideration of Anchorage's transportation needs.

All our elected public officials share in this responsibility so no one level of government should be singled out. They all should be sent a clear message that Anchorage needs additional funds to address transportation needs and they all should be held accountable.

5. SUPPORT PUBLIC OFFICIALS WHO SUPPORT ANCHORAGE

Those individual officials who do work for Anchorage's interests should be supported. It is easy to find something to disagree with an elected official on. Rarely do people agree on everything but people should look to performance as a whole rather than isolated less important single issues. If Anchorage voters don't support those elected officials who stick up for Anchorage they will have fewer and fewer who do so.

CONCLUSION

Anchorage's road system has fallen dangerously behind demand due to government budget reductions, complicated federal regulations, lethargic bureaucracy, lack of public participation, a vocal anti-road element, and competition for limited funding from other Alaskan communities.

The people of Anchorage through grass roots advocacy can help their elected officials work to avoid a future traffic nightmare and improve Anchorage's transportation system in a balanced and community sensitive manner.

DD/jja