BYU NewsNet - Trying to Solve the Traffic Nightmare

By DeNae Bybee

Traffic - that annoying byproduct of the county's exploding population - is only going to get worse as Utah's population is projected to double in the next 30 years to more than 800,000.

The Utah Transit Authority and Utah Department of Transportation are teaming up to try to alleviate this growing problem.

Growing up means change. Utah County is being treated like a big city with major transportation improvements around the corner, including new, major highway corridors; SPUIs (pronounced SPOO-eez), single point urban interchanges; and CFIs, continuous flow intersections, all designed to direct traffic movements in the busiest intersecting areas.

"We're seeing a tremendous amount of growth in communities such as Lehi, Highland, Eagle Mountain, Saratoga Springs, Payson and Spanish Fork," said Geoff Dupaix, UDOT regional spokesman. "There are a lot of transportation projects that have to be done to meet not only today's demands, but tomorrow's as well."

Dupaix said with Utah County's population doubling in the next 30 years, widening I-15 to six lanes in each direction - two lanes wider than in Salt Lake County - from Bangerter Highway to University Parkway will help accommodate the large number of "inter-county" travel.

Another I-15 widening project from University Parkway to south Payson, beginning with four lanes both directions and narrowing to two lanes both ways, is also planned.

In the next five years, major road construction projects like the Mountain View Corridor, to be located west of Lehi from the Salt Lake Valley, and the Vineyard Connector, west of I-15 between American Fork and Orem, will make navigating in and around the county difficult during construction, Dupaix said.

"I-15 in Utah County functions like a main street; it not only carries through-traffic but carries a lot of traffic within the county itself," Dupaix said. "People drive the interstate to go from one community to the next. People may get on one interchange, maybe travel two interchanges down the road and get off the freeway. It's just how I-15 is used - for a lot of local travel, not just local interstate travel."

The FrontRunner communter rail will help relieve traffic congestion on I-15 but "we will never be able to build ourselves out of congestion," Dupaix said. "It will take a variety of different solutions in order for us to maintain the quality of life we have and to maintain the economic growth that we're experiencing. It's going to take various combinations of highways and transit, maybe switching work schedules. It's going to take time. No silver bullet is going to solve all our transportation challenges. There really has to be shared solutions."

As another option, UDOT encourages people to use UTA's light rail and commuter rail where it is available.

Multiple choices of transportation help to spread the congestion across many avenues.

UDOT and UTA were working jointly until recently, when the quarter-cent sales tax initiative passed, enabling UTA to separate its commuter rail project from the I-15 project.

Now, the commuter rail can be finished before I-15 construction starts.

Funding for I-15 and the Mountain View Corridor hasn't been identified yet, Dupaix said. The legislature will have to grapple with that for the next several years.

"[The legislature] will have to look at federal funding, but federal dollars are becoming more scarce," Dupaix said. "More states are having to pay for the cost of these improvements. It will cost over $3 billion just for I-15 alone. Transportation improvements cost a lot of money, and with inflation, it's only becoming more expensive."

Dupaix said I-15 isn't just a widening project - it is also the redesign and rebuilding of the existing interchanges.

The bulk of the interchanges will be single point urban interchanges, or SPUIs, similar to what is at the University Parkway interchange.

"People are going to see some major changes in the interstate," Dupaix said.

Turning left onto Bangerter will be easier this September when the first-ever Utah CFI at Bangerter and 3500 South is finished. The UDOT Web site reports that "heavy rush hour traffic forces drivers to wait for up to four cycles of the traffic signal to get through the intersection. Congestion at this intersection has a ripple effect on other intersections on both 3500 South and Bangerter Highway."

Before any road projects can be started, UDOT must go through a federally mandated environmental process to minimize impact on the environment and surrounding community. They must also ensure the new design meets current and future demand, Dupaix said.

Dupaix said public input is a vital to their decision making, and encourages people to go to www.utah.udot.gov or call him at 801-227-8000 for any questions.

He also said people should read the papers and sign up for the Web site updates.

"The more comments we get, the better decisions we can make," Dupaix said. "UDOT recognizes the value of public dialogue relating to transportation because they are the public users of these roads. We all benefit from roads, not just from driving but this is how we receive goods and services."