Toll 45 SW on track for 2011 construction

Toll 45 SW on track for 2011 construction

By Eric Pulsifer Friday, 30 January 2009

Will Toll 45 SW make traveling by car in southwest Austin easier for you?

Yes
No

Results

The construction of Toll 45 SW, a short stretch of highway that would serve as one of the final pieces in a partial loop around the capital area, is on schedule after facing several delays due to funding problems and negative feedback from environmental groups.

 

Hays and Travis counties purchased the necessary right-of-way for Toll 45 SW in the late ’90s, but setbacks left many who would use the road confused about when, or if, it would be coming.

Originally, the Texas Department of Transportation planned to begin construction on Toll 45 SW this year, but budget issues in 2008 brought the project to a halt. With funding issues now ironed out, TxDOT has completed the design process for Toll 45 SW and is currently working on a biological evaluation to examine the project’s effect on nearby wildlife and water.

The evaluation is just one piece of the overall environmental assessment, which will ultimately be submitted to TxDOT’s environmental division for approval in late 2010.

If all goes according to plan, construction of Toll 45 SW could be put up for bid in December 2010, with building beginning in spring 2011.

As planned today, the 3.6-mile facility will be a six-lane divided roadway, with the two innermost lanes on each side reserved as tolled express lanes. The outer lanes would not be tolled and will be separated from the inner lanes by a concrete barrier. There will be no connecting streets or stoplights, but there will be one exit at Bliss Spillar Road. The project will cost an estimated $76 million.

Priority list

The Capital Area Metropolitan Planning Organization will handle funding for Toll 45 SW. Though typically the organization only pairs federal funds with local projects, CAMPO is working with TxDOT on Toll 45 SW, a state-funded project, because of the roadway’s regional significance.

Toll 45 SW is one of five projects with a total price of $1.5 billion approved by CAMPO in October 2007. Those five tolled projects are being handled by TxDOT and the Central Texas Regional Mobility Authority, an agency created in 2002 to expedite mobility projects in Williamson and Travis counties. TxDOT will build the road, but CTRMA, which also manages Toll 183A, may run it.

TxDOT requested CAMPO transfer construction funding for Toll 45 SW to go to other projects until work on the road is ready to begin. At that time, TxDOT will go before CAMPO to get the project on the metropolitan planning organization’s short-term project list, called the Transportation Improvement Program.

CTRMA Director of Communications Steve Pustelnyk said the agency is focusing on the projects that have the most potential to relieve traffic congestion first.

“We have five main projects that we’re working on right now, and I’d say that 45 SW and the Y in Oak Hill are probably at the end of the priority list at this point,” Pustelnyk said. “As we get through those projects and as the environmental work gets done on the southwest projects, then we’ll be able to turn our priority to those.”

This phase of the environmental process may lead to modifications in design, but it is unlikely the road would be cancelled entirely.

“The main purpose of an environmental study is to examine all the factors that a project may impact to determine if any of those impacts are of a significant nature and need to be mitigated in some way,” Pustelnyk said. “That mitigation can occur in several ways, be it change of design, relocating specific elements of the design, making changes to the approach or rerouting the road.”

Aside from signage, there is no notable difference between a toll project managed by TxDOT or CTRMA. For the near future, any new toll roads will be operated by CTRMA unless built by private concessionary. This is currently unlikely, but may become a more feasible option in the future, Pustelnyk said.

While TxDOT is currently handling environmental work, CTRMA is examining traffic and revenue projections, determining feasibility and funding for the southwest Austin toll roads.

“At this point we believe we can fund them,” Pustelnyk said. “But we just don’t have the details of what that funding will look like.”

After TxDOT and CTRMA conclude their studies, the two agencies will meet to determine how much money they will be able to generate above and beyond what is needed to pay the road’s debt service. CTRMA will then negotiate toll rates and other conditions surrounding acceptance of the project from TxDOT and present those terms to CAMPO, which will approve or disapprove. If approved, the road will be turned over to CTRMA.

Going full circle

The concept of a loop around Austin is more then 20 years old, and while a continuous loop may never be possible, completion of Toll 45 SW would allow travelers to get from MoPac in southwest Austin to several northern corridors to the east.

“Because of the environmental concerns and the very sensitive areas of the greenbelt and the watershed in the west, it’s going to be next to impossible to make a complete loop,” TxDOT spokesman Marcus Cooper said. “But 45 SW would be a great relief valve for much of the traffic in the southwest Austin area.”

With too many environmental issues to deal with in the western portion of Austin to connect the Loop 360/MoPac area down south to IH 35, Toll 45 SW may be the last piece of a fractured loop around the city.

Toll 45 SW will connect to FM 1626, deterring travelers from cutting through Shady Hollow Neighborhood to get east to IH 35, but there are no plans to connect the road all the way to the interstate.

“We’re not looking at completing that loop to IH 35 at this time,” Cooper said. “Its current location is where it’s going to stay for now.”

Future toll projects

Tying FM 1626 to Toll 130 will be Toll 45 SE. The 7.4-mile project is under construction and should open in May 2009. The road will link IH 35 to Toll 130 via a corridor just south of and parallel to FM 1327.

It is likely CTRMA will operate the toll improvements at the Y in Oak Hill. The two major flyovers at the existing Hwy. 290 and Hwy. 71 intersection that create the Y are estimated to cost more than $400 million. Construction is at least two to three years away.

“The Y has been through at least two or three environmental studies, and every time you open it, you have to go through all the public input process again,” Pustelnyk said. “Unfortunately, it causes projects to be delayed what seems like, in many cases, an unreasonable amount of time. But it’s just the federal process; it’s the way it works.”

Construction of Toll 45 SW is scheduled to begin no earlier than 2011. The 3.6-mile, six-lane roadway will include four tolled lanes and two free lanes. It will tie into FM 1626 and give travelers access to IH 35 and a network of roads to the east of Austin via Toll 45 SE. Toll 45 SE is nearly completed and is planned to open in May 2009.

Keeping tabs on tolls

Though toll roads may switch from tolled to free after the project’s debt has been paid back, TxDOT spokesman Marcus Cooper said it would be difficult to predict a road changing over now.

“The main issue is maintenance. Maintenance costs, much like construction costs, are increasing every year,” he said. “We’re coming to a point where there is a continuous need to build the roads and funding is still an issue.”

According to a 2005 study by the Federal Highway Administration, Texas leads the nation in maintenance expenditures with a total of $1.3 billion dollars in upkeep and repair for nearly 200,000 lane-miles of road.

The American Society of Civil Engineers, which rates the nation’s roads and bridges in its Report Card for America’s Infrastructure, estimates that $1.6 trillion in improvements are needed over a five-year period to bring the country’s infrastructure to “good” condition.

Toll roads are financed over several years, and after they are paid off, TxDOT and CTRMA are authorized to improve or build other facilities with that money.

“In principle, when a toll road generates money above and beyond what’s necessary to operate, [CTRMA] has the authority to take that surplus to use it to expand the transportation network in the region,” CTRMA spokesman Steve Pustelnyk said.

For the five major projects the CTRMA and TxDOT are tackling — tolls 183, 290 E, 290 W, 71 W, 71 E and 45 SW — any extra funds generated from tolls may only go toward projects within a certain proximity of each road, keeping the money in the Austin area.