Overlay project planned for I-10
LAFAYETTE — A project to overlay 13 miles of Interstate 10 in Lafayette and St. Martin parishes is expected to begin by the end of 2013, according to Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development officials.
The estimated $76 million project is the largest on DOTD’s 2012-2013 proposed priority list for the Acadiana region.
The list was the subject of a public hearing Wednesday held by the legislature’s Joint Highway Priority Construction Committee.
The interstate overlay project is expected to begin by the end of 2013 and take about two years to complete, according to DOTD.
The project involves “rubbilizing,” or breaking up, the existing road surface and then using the broken road as a base for a 7-inch to 8-inch overlay, said Teddy Babin, with the DOTD’s regional office in Lafayette.
Babin said the overlay will extend from I-10’s interchange with Interstate 49 in Lafayette and continue to the start of the Atchafalaya Basin bridge near Henderson.
The interchange is by far the largest local project to be tagged for funding on the DOTD priority list.
The list also includes a $26 million project to widen Verot School Road between Pinhook Road and Vincent Road. That project, which could ease congestion of a main traffic artery in south Lafayette, is not on the list for funding in the 2012-2013 fiscal year, but it could be bid out for construction the next fiscal year, Babin said.
DOTD is already doing drainage work in the area in preparation for road construction.
Most of the discussion at Wednesday’s public hearing focused on what is not on the DOTD priority list, and local leaders lined up to offer their own road priorities.
Lafayette officials brought a wish list that included possible funding for a new interchange at Johnston Street and Ambassador Caffery Parkway, improvements for Carmel Drive between Lafayette and Breaux Bridge, and a new interchange at I-10 and Ambassador Caffery.
Traffic is often backed up on the exit ramp at the I-10/Ambassador interchange and improvements there “need to be on the radar,” Lafayette City-Parish Director of Public Works Tom Carroll said.
Lafayette officials also asked DOTD to sign off on a plan developed locally for frontage roads along I-10.
There is no prospect for funding the frontage roads at this time, but DOTD approval of the local plan is needed before there is any hope of funding.
“Without this approved plan, we are spinning in the mud,” Lafayette City-Parish Councilman Kenneth Boudreaux said.
Competition for state road money is tight.
DOTD’s proposed construction budget for next fiscal year is about $757 million, which does not go far to address a backlog of road projects estimated at $12.4 billion, according to figures from DOTD.
St. Landry Parish President Bill Fontenot and Lafayette City-Parish Director of Transportation Tony Tramel both asked the legislative committee to consider changes that would allow local governments the option of seeking gas taxes to support road work.
“We need a revenue source to solve these issues,” Tramel said.
Fontenot, a former DOTD administrator, said state officials should be straightforward with residents that there is not enough money to meet the state’s critical transportation needs.
“It’s simply not happening,” Fontenot said. “… We need to give the people full disclosure.”
Local governments could not pursue local-option gas taxes without a state constitutional amendment, which would require approval from the Legislature and voters.