Reprint from the Progress Times - August 8, 2008
©Progress Times 2008 - All Rights Reserved

 

RMA toll road project on fast track

 

By Jim Brunson

It’s clear that the Hidalgo County Regional Mobility Authority (RMA) is doing all it can to put plans for a new $700 million county loop toll road on the fast track.

The RMA has hired Hidalgo County Road Builders, a firm created by Gerry Pate, president of Pate Transportation Partners. Pate has assembled a team of companies with expertise in each of the specialties to move the project forward—fast.

Preliminary environmental studies have been performed by environmental consulting firm, PBS & J, to help planners select the “technically preferred alignment” which is being presented to the public in a series of open house meetings this week and next.

Right-of-way acquisition will be led by a firm specializing in that area, Property Acquisition Services.

Local firms, such as J.E. Saenz & Associates, Inc. and L&G Engineering have been brought on board to perform engineering services including route planning studies.

Even as route planning studies are taking place, other teams of experts are working on a package of financing plans and legal issues.

The public has turned out in modest numbers during the first two open house meetings held this week. The first of a series of meetings to present the “technically preferred alignment” to the public was held Tuesday at Valley View High School in Hidalgo. Just over 50 people attended that meeting, in addition to a host of representatives for Hidalgo County Road Builders and the companies they have contracted for services.

Hidalgo County RMA board secretary/treasurer Ramiro Salazar, a retired TxDOT engineer said they hope to begin construction as early as mid-2010.

“The priority is to get the bridge traffic to the north,” he said. He identified the most southerly portion of the proposed loop, “Section A,” as the most pressing since it will pick up the international truck traffic coming across each of Hidalgo County’s ports of entry. The next step is to build a road to move that traffic around the most populated areas of the county to the north and connect with Highway 281 north of Edinburg.

Section A also happens to be the most difficult section to build because that area has more development and the proposed road alignment has to zig and zag to avoid U.S. Fish and Wildlife preserves and other environmentally sensitive areas.

The alignment in the proximity of the Anzalduas International Crossing poses some difficulties for the planners. One route alternative studied would have put the toll road right in front of the GSA inspection facilities for the new international bridge, on the north side. Project planners were hesitant to explain exactly why a different route was selected which makes the toll road swing south toward the Rio Grande and just on the south side of the GSA facilities. It seems that major landholders in the area and the City of McAllen influenced the decision to move the proposed route south.

A map showing the “technically preferred alignment” for the proposed toll road is available for viewing on the Progress Times Web site at www.progresstimes.net.

Two more open houses will be held next week where the public will be able to view large maps detailing the proposed alignment and ask questions of various project consultants as well as RMA board members. The first of those meetings will be held Tuesday, August 12, 5:30 p.m. at Edinburg North High School Library, located at 3101 N. Closner, Edinburg.

Wednesday, August 13, at 5:30 p.m., a meeting will be held in the McAllen Chamber of Com¬merce Conference Room, located at 1200 Ash Avenue. This will be the county-wide meeting where the entire loop project will be discussed.

Written comments relative to the proposed project may be presented at any of the meetings or submitted to the HCRMA staff at the Hidalgo County Road Builders office, located at 801 W. Nolana, Suite 205, McAllen, Texas 78504.

You can see the RMA Hidalgo County Loop maps by clicking the following links Section A, Section B, Section C, Section D.