By Kelly Doran
Sun staff
The Ohio Department of Transportation is holding a meeting to provide more information and discuss the possibility of relocating state Route 32.
The possibility of relocating 32 is one of four segments of the Eastern Corridor project, which is working to improve current and future transportation needs.
The meeting on June 4 is to provide additional information and hear from those interviewed for the situation assessment. It’s a working group, not a public meeting, Brian Cunningham, communications manager at ODOT, said.
If the project moves forward, there will be open meetings to gather public input, Cunningham said.
The project has been very open to the public so far, and as this meeting is an update from ODOT, County Engineer Pat Manger does not see an issue with the meeting not being public. This will not be the last time they discuss the relocation.
Nathan Alley, conservation program coordinator for the Sierra Club, is very curious to hear what ODOT has to say because it is an invite only meeting and because he does not think there is a solution to moving forward with the project that would eliminate the Sierra Club’s concerns.
In addition, ODOT sent a new agenda on June 1 revising the first agenda that shortened the meeting by two hours, although 45 minutes was due to eliminating a lunch break.
The agenda includes time for Consensus Building Institute to discuss the meeting purpose and present a summary of their key findings and some of their considerations moving forward. It also includes a presentation by ODOT on the factors to consider and the proposed approach to the project.
The agenda also includes a facilitated open discussion for an hour. It also states that no decisions will be made and that ODOT is not giving a specific project alternative.
“We would like to share our current thinking about how to proceed with the state Route 32 relocation aspect of the Eastern Corridor program and to hear your thoughts about these ideas,” the invitation from ODOT states.
The invitation calls the meeting an “Informal focus group.”
The Sierra Club wishes the meeting was public because the project is being funded by public dollars, Alley said, but they are not protesting the meeting.
“It certainly, I would think, be better serviced if it was (open),” Alley said.
Everyone who was interviewed was invited to the meeting, Cunningham said.
However, the list of those invited included with the invitation ODOT sent out does not include everyone listed as an interviewee in the Situation Assessment.
There has not been a lot of forward movement in development of the relocation, said Cunningham.
CBI was brought in to interview some of the groups involved and assess the issues and concerns with the relocation, in addition to positive benefits of it, Cunningham said.
CBI put together a “Situation Assessment,” which was published in November, Cunningham said.
“While no solution may satisfy everyone, we believe it may be possible to take a more inclusive, collaborative approach to the decision making—an effort that has potential to build trust and generate more creative and useful options that have a better chance of meeting as broad a range of interests as possible,” the Situation Assessment states.
CBI found three key perspectives in their investigation: the relocation is essential and will result in much needed benefits, the relocation is not necessary and will cause intolerable impacts on the area it goes through and the relocation would be positive but there are various other approaches that may get more support.
To gather those perspectives, CBI interviewed over 100 stakeholders in the project.
Now, there will be additional communication and opportunities for people to voice their concerns and discuss benefits of the project. After that, ODOT will decide how to move forward, Cunningham said.
If the relocation does move forward, there has not been a decision on where 32 would be moved to, although there are areas identified as feasible options, Cunningham said.
The issue with this segment of the project is that it is not to the point where there is a preferred route, Manger said. It is still in the study phase, but the sooner they find a preferred route the better, he said.
Manger feels they need to look into this for the Clermont County citizens who travel downtown everyday.
“We owe it to those folks to look at options and look at alternatives,” Manger said.
Even if the result is deciding to do nothing, Manger feels they owe it to the citizens to thoroughly look at the options. This is a regional problem that needs to be looked at on a regional basis, Manger said.
A new route for 32 would have to go through either Newtown or Mariemont. Alley, along with the Club, does not believe that the people in those communities want a major highway going through their communities.
In addition, Hamilton County has a lot of high priority transportation projects not currently funded, so spending money on building a highway does not make sense to Alley when preexisting needs are not being met.
Another issue the Sierra Club has with the relocation is it will allow people to travel from the Eastgate area to downtown more easily, which will likely mean people will build more houses in the Eastgate area and will create more pollution because they live further away from their jobs, Alley said.
The relocation would also likely involve building a bridge over the Little Miami River, which was the first river in Ohio to be designated as a Wild and Scenic River, Alley said. That is a federal designation that says the river is worth protecting.
Building a bridge usually disturbs the bed and bank of the river and normally ODOT would not be allowed to build on a scenic river but ODOT believes they can build a bridge that won’t disturb the bed and bank, Alley said.
Even if that is possible, the car trips over the bridge will add pollution and take away from the experience of the Little Miami, Alley said.