Panel approves MoDOT reductions
JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. — Missouri drivers, including Nodaway Countians, will see limited maintenance on some roads as the state’s transportation department grapples with a budget shortfall.
The Missouri Highways and Transportation Commission has approved a plan that will focus MoDOT efforts on about one-fourth of the state’s 32,000 miles of roads when the agency’s annual construction budget drops to a projected $325 million in 2017.
The department plans to keep 8,000 miles of primary highways — those that connect Missouri’s larger towns and cities — in good shape, while other roads will get only minimal maintenance such as filling potholes.
Commission Chair Stephen Miller said the proposal will result in the inevitable deterioration of roads and bridges.
The plan, first outlined by the agency last month, and was put together after voters in August rejected a sales tax increase to generate additional transportation revenues.
Miller said the blueprint, which MoDOT has named the 325 System, calls for limited maintenance of “supplemental” roads and bridges using internal resources, meaning department personnel and equipment, as opposed to contractors who are awarded major road and bridge projects after submitting competitive bids.
That scaled-back work is expected to include pavement patching and the flushing and sealing of bridge decks. MoDOT officials say such actions will help but won’t be enough to keep supplementary roads from deteriorating over time.
“Missouri has the seventh largest highway system in the nation, but we rank 46th in revenue per mile,” said MoDOT Director Dave Nichols. “This plan prioritizes what we do with that shrinking revenue, but the only way to truly change Missouri’s status is to find a long-term funding solution.”
MoDOT estimates an additional $160 million each year in new state funding would allow the department to match all available federal funds and take care of the entire highway system in its current condition.
According to MoDOT Area Engineer Michael Rinehart, the department is under the gun in terms of federal funding, which he said could become a critical factor in 2017 when the state will no longer be able to provide a match for the full amount of federal dollars to which it is entitled.
He said unless additional revenue sources are found, Missouri stands to lose $167 million in highway funding in fiscal 2017, a figure that could balloon to nearly $400 million in subsequent years.
In Nodaway County, primary routes eligible for contract jobs are limited to limited to Highway 136, Highway 148 and Highway 71.
Conspicuously absent from the list are Highway 46 — the sole paved access to Northwest Missouri Regional Airport — Highway 113 and Highway 246, along with all of the lettered farm-to-market blacktops that form a lifeline each fall for farmers trucking row crops to area gran elevators.
One of the biggest concerns is bridges, many of which could be reduced to a single lane, weight limited or even closed. Examples close to Maryville include two aging spans on Highway 46 just west of the airport that due to their to their decrepit condition have already been taken down to one lane.
“Roads will get rougher and bridges will close,” Rinehart told the Nodaway County Commission during a visit to Maryville last month. “That’s where we’re headed.”
