New Hampshire’s Transportation Commissioner and the Executive Council traveled to the western part of the state today.
They are meeting with towns to discuss the department’s proposals to curtail or eliminate many projects in the state’s ten year Transportation Plan.
Yesterday, the Councilors and Commissioner joined Governor John Lynch to inspect some heavily corroded bridges on the Spaulding Turnpike.
Transportation officials say the Spaulding is in rough shape, and the Governor says rebuilding it is high on his list of priorities.
State Transportation officials showed Governor Lynch and the Executive Council the effects of 50 years of wear and tear on some of the Spaulding Turnpike’s bridges.
Harvey Goodwin, who heads DOT’s Turnpike division, pointed to sections where the concrete had fallen away.
To protect cars traveling below, state workers strung netting below the bridges to catch any falling debris.
Both of these bridges have been netted, most recently. There are 41 bridges in the state of nh now that have been netted because of deteriorating concrete, loose concrete that falls into traffic. You can see its just netted over the travel lanes to prevent concrete from falling on vehicles.
Transportation officials showed the Governor and Councilors three bridges on the Spaulding that were severely corroded and needed replacement.
And the DOT estimates that replacing each bridge would take about 3 years, even if an all out effort began immediately.
A top official said the bridges would have to be handled sequentially, because of the difficulty of diverting heavy traffic on the Spaulding.
But Governor Lynch asked acting Transportation Commissioner Charles O’Leary if there might be a better way to approach the project.
Why wouldn’t it be easier to manage the traffic control if you did it all at the same time?...i mean, if we could do it all in three years, wouldn’t it be better than doing it over nine years? I’d like the opportunity to study that and look back on that.
The Governor and Council also got a look at the spot in Rochester where the Spaulding narrows from a four lane divided highway to two lanes separated by a double yellow line.
Harvey Goodwin, the Turnpikes chief, said the abrupt change catches too many drivers by surprise.
This is the section of highway where we tend to have the head on collisions because people tend to have a lapse while they’re driving or they don’t pay attention as we all do at times and this is the very critical section of the roadway from here going north all the way to exit 16.
DOT officials have estimated it would cost one hundred seventy seven million dollars to rebuild the Spaulding bridges and widen the road.
The department has very little money on hand to pay for the project.
In fact DOT Commissioner O’Leary has been very outspoken about the department’s shaky financial ground.
And he’s suggested the state needs to increase the gas tax or highway tolls to pay for overall needed repairs.
Governor Lynch says he’s asked the Commissioner to work up a plan to schedule the Spaulding Turnpike’s road work and find funding sources.
In the meantime, the old Spaulding bridges aren’t the only ones in the state highway system that are showing signs of decay.
While on Wednesday’s inspection, Councilor Ray Wiezorik of Manchester heard as much from a top Transportation official.
This is the second worst bridge in the state, right? No, no..there’s some on I 93 I believe…those that, uh that we’re talking about replacing. Yeah, down in windham and salem and derry….thery’re worse than this Londonderry….
Those bridges were slated to be repaired as part of the project to widen I-93.
But that project has been delayed.
A judge last week ruled that the state didn’t do sufficient analysis to determine how much a bigger highway would lead to population growth.
Governor Lynch has asked DOT officials to have their analysis of a construction timetable and a financing plan for the Spaulding Turnpike ready in less than two weeks.
That way, the analysis would be ready in time for the next meeting of the Governor and Executive Council.
