Expansion riles residents

Tension and emotion filled the air at the Unitarian Universalist Church, as Bloomington residents meted out the consequences of a plan to expand State Road 46.\nThe Indiana Department of Transportation held a public hearing last night to discuss a $16.9 million plan that would expand and modify a section of State Road 46 between Kinser Pike and 3rd Street. The purpose of the hearing was to further explain the project and gather constructive criticism from the community. This feedback will be used to determine the final design plans for the expansion.\n"These are not the final plans," said INDOT Hearings Examiner Chris Jolivette. "Your comments may alter the final designs."\nThe plan to expand the bypass, a reaction to the steadily increasing traffic flow along the roughly three-mile corridor, has been in the works since the initial site assessment in 1995. It includes the addition of travel lanes on State Road 46, channelization improvements at various intersections, a pedestrian overpass and underpass, multi-use sidewalks, the creation and closure of several streets and improved landscaping. If all goes as planned, the project should begin in spring 2003.\n"The project will take two years to complete," said Tim Muench, of the INDOT Design Division. "Knock on wood, it'll be done by the end of the 2004 construction season."\nBut not if some Bloomington residents can help it. \nFred Brinegar has spent his whole life ' save for 21 months in the Army ' in Bloomington. Since 1985, he and his wife Dee have owned a house at the corner of Dunn Street and State Road 46. Now, he said, INDOT is threatening to cut his property in half with additional bypass lanes.\n"They're going to take part of the front yard and a turn lane on the east side of our house," Brinegar said during the public statement portion. "They'll give us permission to use our basement driveway for at least three years, and then they can continue or reject that."\nBrinegar stood in the crowded hallway outside the hearing room and pointed at the various colored lines surrounding his property on the enormous plans that lined the walls. Not only will the highway force him to give up his land and the outside access to his basement, he said, but it will also provide a round-the-clock noise disturbance.\n"You can hear the cars go by from our bedroom now," Brinegar said. "I do not intend to stay there and be next to a highway with 21,000 cars going by."\nBrinegar's solution to this dilemma is to have the state pay to move the house back on his property. That way, he argued, they could have their land, and he could have his house.\n"I'm an old man," he sighed. "Now I come here, and I don't like what I see or what I hear. I think we should be given the offer to let them have the front land and the east side, but I think our house ' where we will live for the rest of our lives ' should be protected and moved back from the highway."\nWhile Brinegar is one of the very few people whose property will be dramatically affected by the expansion, many residents and officials expressed their disgust with the project for other reasons.\nMari Bertuccio, an IU graduate and former Bloomington resident, compared what's happening here to events that have recently taken place in Portland, Ore., where she now lives.\n"It gets to a point where things are almost perfect," she said of Bloomington's current state. "That lasts about a year, and then something like this happens."\nBertuccio's grievance against the expansion is more environmental than possessive. She finds fault with INDOT's plan to uproot existing trees during construction.\n"You cannot ever cut down a large tree and plant a spindly tree," she said. "This is gonna' change your climate, the smell, the look of this entire little city."\nAlthough the majority of those present had complaints about some aspect of the expansion project, there were a few ' including representatives from IU ' who lauded the city's efforts to lighten the load on the overcrowded stretch of highway.\n"I'd like to make it clear that IU supports the addition of two travel lanes," said IU Director of Real Estate Lynn Coyne. "We feel this is critical to the movement of traffic around the area."\nCoyne suggested a few minor changes to the project ' such as a more agreeable landscape plan and putting additional thought into the overpass at 10th Street ' but overall, he backed the improvements it would bring to student transportation and safety.\nOther concerns raised at the hearing included: the prospect of a separate bicycle path to avoid pedestrian-cyclist accidents; the noise disturbances the two-year construction plan would create; and the possibility that this project might not solve the traffic problem in Bloomington.\nINDOT and Bloomington officials will continue to hear concerns and questions about the project through Sept. 20.\n"You still have two weeks to give us your concerns regarding this project," said Jolivette. "The next step in this process will be to develop a final design report, and when this report is approved, a legal notice of intent will be published in local news media."\nThose wishing to learn more about the specifics of this project can contact the Indiana Department of Transportation at (317) 234-0796 or the Bloomington City Engineer at 349-3417. Residents who want to participate in the evaluation of this project can mail their comments to INDOT's Hearing Office, e-mail them to cjolivette@indot.in.us or fax them to (317) 232-1499.