Road Widening

I drive along 606 and route 50 in the morning/evening, depending upon the office i work out of.

I notice on 50 between Loudoun County Pkwy and SR Blvd toll brothers is paying for expanding the road for that 1 mile at the most and the same on 606 where they have build the new warehouses and the shopping center both areas are 2 lanes in each direction (thought the extra lanes are not used and striped off)

I understand the county wants developers to pay for these improvements but why not have them front the money and do the contruction all at one time instead of in pieces and small chunks. I'm sure it's been discussed numerous times but it's just annoying to see traffic growing and our roads not going anywhere even with county coffers growing pretty fast. I'm sure the schools take a good piece of tax revenue to keep growing but roads must be a priority at some point.

 

I agree with you that roads need to become a priority - but doubt they ever will.
While I am in no way a proponent of tax increases the fact that the General Assembly never seems to come up with a dedicated source of funding road improvments should be the clearest signal of this.
I personally am tired of hearing about using "surpluses" for transportation - it was not long ago that the surpluses dryed up and transportation funding was almost cut to nothing. And the current surplus many legislators want to use for other project instead of transportation anyway.
It will be interesting to see if they come up with anything useful this year or if it is another year of the same - nothing.
In addition, we are stuck paying for the rest of the states projects and sending money south to never see it again.

And to your point why not let the county collect and then do it all at once - I would rather see it done than have the money sit in some fund for the next 20 years while I sit in my car for longer and longer everyday. At least the builders are living up to their commitments.

Tolls = Taxes
You just feel better about it - or so I hear.

 

The County doesn't want the money, b/c the private sector can always construct roadways cheaper and faster than the government. While it is frustrating to get only sections of 4-lanes, it's pavement on the ground and hopefully will facilitate future expansions. One bad example is on 659 between the Greenway and Truro Parish- a couple of rezonings came in, said "let's establish a Road Club to pool all our money together". That happened, and now they're saying they don't have enough money to do the improvements. It would have been better to get each to do their own individual frontage improvements.

Beahmer- about roads becoming a priority- pay attention to this year's Board of Supervisors' Budget discussions. They are now finally talking about using General Obligation bonds to pay for road improvements- something this County has never done before (but Fairfax and Prince William have). I think it's a very big first step into getting the improvements we need.

 

dcdavis-
But if your boss had supported the much needed hospital, 659 would have been widened to 4 lanes from the Greenway to Brambleton, would have been done all at once, and would have been paid for by HCA!
(Sorry, had to throw this in. I miss the hospital forums).

 

OH good grief ... !!

Neil Z.
Resident since 1999