Answers due mid-2012 in Tower Terrace interchange justification study

Interest was high Tuesday at the first meeting to explain the latest study into the need for a Tower Terrace Road interchange at Interstate 380.

Almost 80 area residents turned out at a Iowa Department of Transportation meeting at Hiawatha City Hall Tuesday afternoon to explain how the $405,496 study will go and gather public comments.

The interchange would be key to reducing congestion at the Boyson Road interchange to the south, proponents say, and would likely have the side benefit of stimulating growth in the slated Tower Terrace Road corridor from I-380 to County Home Road. But the Federal Highway Administration must be satisfied that the interchange would be needed, due to regulations intended to restrict overdevelopment of costly and unnecessary interchanges on the interstate highway system.

The last study in 2006 found an interchange was not warranted until after a series of other improvements were made on the local road network, mostly in Hiawatha. The new study is premised on the possibility that traffic conditions and development in the area have changed enough since 2006 to warrant a interchange. Funded 50-50 by the DOT and Corridor Metropolitan Planning Organization, the study is being done by consulting firm HNTB in coordination with another study of the I-380 corridor through the Cedar Rapids metro area and a study of the environmental impact of building an interchange.

Participants in Tuesday's open house-style meeting were handed an overview of the project. They could look at interpretive display boards and ask questions of DOT officials.

District 6 Transportation Planner Cathy Cutler said the preliminary study findings and recommendations are expected to be released prior to a public comment meeting in mid-2012.The full report won't be prepared and submitted until the fall of 2012, after public comments have been analyzed and incorporated.

Work now under way on the project includes wetlands assessments, archaeological studies, and natural biology assessments. The environmental study process will also examine impacts on agricultural land and residents of the area, Cutler added. A second public meeting will be held in early spring.

The DOT doesn't really expect the studies to identify any "project stoppers," Cutler said, in part because most of the right-of-way for a diamond-style interchange at Tower Terrace Road was acquired when I-380 was built.

If a interchange is warranted, Cutler said slightly more land may be required now because interchange design standards have changed.

The interchange justification study will look at an area from County Home Road to the north of Tower Terrace through Boyson Road to the south, and even at Blairs Ferry Road further south. One reason is that the previous study indicated that I-380 be expanded to six lanes from Tower Terrace through Blairs Ferry.

The meeting brought out many public officials and elected officials from Marion, as well as Hiawatha, who are pointedly in favor of the interchange. Hiawatha Mayor Tom Theis, a interchange supporter, was delighted by the high turnout.

Some residents at the meeting were h less drawn to the project. Among them was business woman Cindy Golding, who owns a farm on Tower Terrace west of I-380, and recently ran for Iowa State Senate.

Golding said she planned to raise questions about traffic counts that were conducted on Tower Terrace while other key interchanges and arteries in the area were blocked during construction season.

Some property owners on the east side of the interchange are strongly in favor of the project because of the commercial prospects for their land an interchange would bring, Golding said. Residents on the west side take a more mixed view.

Golding, who runs a research business, said she'll be interested in seeing the final results of the study. Although not against the project, she said she doesn't want to see state dollars spent if the interchange isn't necessary due to the state's tight budget.

"The devil's in the details," Golding said.

Asked about Golding's traffic count comments, DOT District Engineer James Schnoebelen said the counts could be redone if the road closures could not be accounted for through modeling.