Chief
03-10-2008, 05:38 AM
http://columbian.com/news/localNews/2008/03/03102008_Supporters-of-third-bridge-call-for-outcry.cfm
Monday, March 10, 2008
By HOWARD BUCK, Columbian staff writer
Shunned by a Columbia River Crossing task force that seems intent on a new Interstate 5 span with rapid transit, boosters of a third bridge want Clark County residents to bombard local leaders with demands to reconsider.
Their rally cry, lifted straight from last year’s solid defeat of a Port of Vancouver tax levy: Don’t let anyone tell you the deal is done.
“The elected officials will do what you want, if you call, if you write,” said Debbie Peterson, who organized a forum Sunday that drew about 40 people to the county’s Public Service Center.
“Do it every day, have your friends do it every day, and it will make a difference,” she said. Suggested targets are Clark County commissioners and Vancouver city council members.
Peterson is a Republican who plans to run for the legislative seat now held by Rep. Bill Fromhold, D-Vancouver.
Her guest Sunday was Sharon Nasset, a Portlander who has long pushed for a new truck, commuter traffic and transit route that would cross the Columbia near the existing railroad bridge, which is west and downriver of the I-5 bridge.
Using charts, excerpts from regional planning studies and e-mail messages, Nasset recounted how the “third-bridge option” got shoved aside by the CRC panel, for political and other reasons.
But the forum’s high point came when Jerry Oliver, newly elected Port of Vancouver commissioner, stood to endorse much of Nasset’s argument.
Oliver rode public anger over the port tax to unseat three-term incumbent Arch Miller in November, making his point all the more compelling.
“I’m a strong proponent. I believe in a third bridge,” Oliver said. “We need to keep pushing, like water dripping on a stone.”
Oliver said he and most Southwest Washington residents share blame for letting the Crossing panel push a plan to rebuild existing I-5 spans.
“There is an agenda. It’s not something that’s really addressing the needs of commuters,” Oliver said. A self-described “pro-growth, pro-jobs” advocate, he predicts daily commuters to Portland will triple to 180,000 as Clark County doubles in population within 20 years, he said.
To ward off disaster, he urged anti-light rail and pro-third bridge forces to crowd critical upcoming CRC meetings.
A “preferred local option” and draft environmental impact statement will be weighed at public hearings set for April 28 at the Hilton Vancouver Washington, and April 30 at the Red Lion Hotel on Jantzen Beach.
Before that are several open CRC meetings with Clark County community groups.
“We need to pack that meeting on April 28,” Oliver said. Given the pending CRC alternatives of a new I-5 span with light rail or express bus lanes attached or a “no-build” option, “My favorite option would be ‘no build,’ ” he said. “We need a fourth option.”
Nasset said regional planners trying to uncork Vancouver-Portland’s I-5 and rail bottlenecks long ago identified a corridor that links the two cities’ bustling ports as one answer.
According to National Environmental Protection Act (NEPA) guidelines, that third-bridge option deserves careful study equal to evaluation of the existing I-5 route, she said. Instead, the Crossing panel purposefully squeezed the range of scope to preclude any new corridor, she said.
“Do not let them say it’s ‘outside of the project area,’ ” Nasset said. The intersection of major rail lines, ports and truck traffic all point to the “BiState Industrial Corridor” she proposes, she said.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v645/SeniorChieftain/Map_w_Labels.jpg
“Your elected officials have a right to pull the plug” on I-5 bridge replacement, Nasset said.
Vancouver’s Peterson said CRC declined an invitation to have a representative at Sunday’s forum.
Attempts by The Columbian to reach a CRC spokesperson on Sunday were unsuccessful.
Traffic engineers previously rejected the alternate bridge as a congestion-buster because it would not drain enough of mounting traffic from I-5. But third-bridge proponents argue that I-5 chokepoints near central Portland doom effectiveness of a new, $4 billion I-5 bridge.
Points raised by Nasset:
* How to get southbound traffic from I-5 to a bridge that would access Hayden Island and north Portland? Build a viaduct to whisk traffic above Mill Plain Boulevard, removing truck traffic from downtown, she said.
* To critics who say motorists won’t detour an extra mile to reach the bridge, she wonders why a bridge toll is suggested for I-205 — a six-mile detour — when I-5 is tolled.
* Clark County residents must insist on consistent, transparent planning as future corridors and light-rail lines are mapped. She compared shifting routes of proposed light rail along Vancouver’s Main Street, Broadway or McLoughlin Boulevard to the recent bungling of a proposed Cesar Chavez Boulevard name change by Portland city council members.
“Moving it around willy-nilly because someone complained, that’s not (effective) process,” Nasset said.
Monday, March 10, 2008
By HOWARD BUCK, Columbian staff writer
Shunned by a Columbia River Crossing task force that seems intent on a new Interstate 5 span with rapid transit, boosters of a third bridge want Clark County residents to bombard local leaders with demands to reconsider.
Their rally cry, lifted straight from last year’s solid defeat of a Port of Vancouver tax levy: Don’t let anyone tell you the deal is done.
“The elected officials will do what you want, if you call, if you write,” said Debbie Peterson, who organized a forum Sunday that drew about 40 people to the county’s Public Service Center.
“Do it every day, have your friends do it every day, and it will make a difference,” she said. Suggested targets are Clark County commissioners and Vancouver city council members.
Peterson is a Republican who plans to run for the legislative seat now held by Rep. Bill Fromhold, D-Vancouver.
Her guest Sunday was Sharon Nasset, a Portlander who has long pushed for a new truck, commuter traffic and transit route that would cross the Columbia near the existing railroad bridge, which is west and downriver of the I-5 bridge.
Using charts, excerpts from regional planning studies and e-mail messages, Nasset recounted how the “third-bridge option” got shoved aside by the CRC panel, for political and other reasons.
But the forum’s high point came when Jerry Oliver, newly elected Port of Vancouver commissioner, stood to endorse much of Nasset’s argument.
Oliver rode public anger over the port tax to unseat three-term incumbent Arch Miller in November, making his point all the more compelling.
“I’m a strong proponent. I believe in a third bridge,” Oliver said. “We need to keep pushing, like water dripping on a stone.”
Oliver said he and most Southwest Washington residents share blame for letting the Crossing panel push a plan to rebuild existing I-5 spans.
“There is an agenda. It’s not something that’s really addressing the needs of commuters,” Oliver said. A self-described “pro-growth, pro-jobs” advocate, he predicts daily commuters to Portland will triple to 180,000 as Clark County doubles in population within 20 years, he said.
To ward off disaster, he urged anti-light rail and pro-third bridge forces to crowd critical upcoming CRC meetings.
A “preferred local option” and draft environmental impact statement will be weighed at public hearings set for April 28 at the Hilton Vancouver Washington, and April 30 at the Red Lion Hotel on Jantzen Beach.
Before that are several open CRC meetings with Clark County community groups.
“We need to pack that meeting on April 28,” Oliver said. Given the pending CRC alternatives of a new I-5 span with light rail or express bus lanes attached or a “no-build” option, “My favorite option would be ‘no build,’ ” he said. “We need a fourth option.”
Nasset said regional planners trying to uncork Vancouver-Portland’s I-5 and rail bottlenecks long ago identified a corridor that links the two cities’ bustling ports as one answer.
According to National Environmental Protection Act (NEPA) guidelines, that third-bridge option deserves careful study equal to evaluation of the existing I-5 route, she said. Instead, the Crossing panel purposefully squeezed the range of scope to preclude any new corridor, she said.
“Do not let them say it’s ‘outside of the project area,’ ” Nasset said. The intersection of major rail lines, ports and truck traffic all point to the “BiState Industrial Corridor” she proposes, she said.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v645/SeniorChieftain/Map_w_Labels.jpg
“Your elected officials have a right to pull the plug” on I-5 bridge replacement, Nasset said.
Vancouver’s Peterson said CRC declined an invitation to have a representative at Sunday’s forum.
Attempts by The Columbian to reach a CRC spokesperson on Sunday were unsuccessful.
Traffic engineers previously rejected the alternate bridge as a congestion-buster because it would not drain enough of mounting traffic from I-5. But third-bridge proponents argue that I-5 chokepoints near central Portland doom effectiveness of a new, $4 billion I-5 bridge.
Points raised by Nasset:
* How to get southbound traffic from I-5 to a bridge that would access Hayden Island and north Portland? Build a viaduct to whisk traffic above Mill Plain Boulevard, removing truck traffic from downtown, she said.
* To critics who say motorists won’t detour an extra mile to reach the bridge, she wonders why a bridge toll is suggested for I-205 — a six-mile detour — when I-5 is tolled.
* Clark County residents must insist on consistent, transparent planning as future corridors and light-rail lines are mapped. She compared shifting routes of proposed light rail along Vancouver’s Main Street, Broadway or McLoughlin Boulevard to the recent bungling of a proposed Cesar Chavez Boulevard name change by Portland city council members.
“Moving it around willy-nilly because someone complained, that’s not (effective) process,” Nasset said.