Saturday, October 16, 2004

City not giving up on last mile of cross-town freeway

OSCAR ABEYTA

Tucson Citizen

Marathon runners say the last mile is the hardest. The same could be said of Tucson's only attempt to build a crosstown expressway.

Barraza-Aviation Parkway was to have linked Interstate 10 with Golf Links Road. The route followed railroad tracks, meaning no homes were in the way. A slice of Davis-Monthan Air Force Base provided the right of way for Golf Links. The two roads former a continuous route to the far East Side.

Much of Barraza-Aviation was build with relatively little controversy, but the last mile, from Broadway to West Sixth Street, was derailed by widespread opposition, the city's real estate director, John Updike, said.

"What ADOT (Arizona Department of Transportation) proposed was essentially a freeway - what was called a Chinese wall - that would have completely cut off Fourth Avenue from downtown," Updike said. "The community rose up in the 1980s and said, 'No, we're not going to put up with the state doing that to our community.' "

ADOT gave up those plans and turned responsibility for building and paying for the project over to the city.

Without the estimated $50 million it would take to build the parkway, the route exists only on paper. But officially, the city still has plans to build it.

Andy McGovern, engineering design manager for the Tucson Department of Transportation, said the parkway is still important.

"Completion of the last mile is the top priority because of the limited number of ways to get around the downtown area. And with redevelopment, those will get more congested," he said.

The route of the parkway as designed runs north of the railroad tracks from Broadway to past Sixth Avenue, then crosses under the tracks near Stone Avenue and along what is now Franklin Street until it reaches Sixth Street.

But that alignment would eliminate much of the nascent warehouse arts district. The City Council this year accepted a plan for the warehouse district that calls for changing the alignment of the parkway to preserve the warehouses.

Staff members have been told to keep the parkway on the north side of tracks from Sixth to Church avenues, said Transportation Department spokesman Michael Graham.

While no new proposal is final, city officials say they plan to reconvene the Barraza-Aviation Parkway-Downtown Citizen Advisory Committee.

McGovern said the city hopes the new Regional Transportation Authority will secure voter approval for a road plan that includes the parkway completion, along with a half-cent sales tax to fund the plan.

Even if the parkway were funded, Tucsonans would not see the project completed soon. It would likely take 10 to 15 years of planning and construction before the first car travels the last mile.