Public Meetings Set for Transportation Sales Tax Project List
The Southern Georgia Regional Transportation Roundtable has set a series
of public meetings to review the Draft Constrained Investment List for
the following counties, representing the Special District for a proposed
transportation sales and use tax: Atkinson, Bacon, Ben Hill, Berrien,
Brantley, Brooks, Charlton, Clinch, Coffee, Cook, Echols, Irwin, Lanier,
Lowndes, Pierce, Tift, Turner, and Ware.
In 2010, Governor Sonny Perdue signed into law the Transportation
Investment Act of 2010, a law prescribing a regional sales tax referendum
for transportation projects. Jay Roberts, State Representative from
District 154-Ocilla, and Chairman of the House Transportation Committee,
said “This law gives
Snake Nation Decision, Lowndes County Commission, Tonight 5:30PM
Work Session, Lowndes County Commission (LCC),
Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 22 August 2011.
Videos by Gretchen Quarterman for LAKE, the Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange.
LOWNDES COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS
PROPOSED AGENDA
WORK SESSION, MONDAY, AUGUST 22, 2011, 8:30 a.m.
REGULAR SESSION, TUESDAY, AUGUST 23, 2011, 5:30 p.m.
327 N. Ashley Street – 2nd Floor
Call to Order
Invocation
Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag
Minutes for Approval
Work Session — August 8, 2011
Regular Session — August 9, 2011
For Consideration
Change Order to Snake Nation Road Contract
Assistance to Firefighters Grant
James Road Water Main Repair
Capacity Fee Waiver for Country View Mobile Home Park
SCADA Upgrade
USGS Funding Agreement for Hwy 122 Stream Gauge
Declaration of Merchandise as Surplus — Fire Department and Public Works
Approval of TAN and Resolution
Bids
Training Tower for the Fire Department
Asphalt Surfacing at Naylor and Clyattville Parks
Striping and Signage on 29.34 Miles of Roadway
Reports-County Manager
Citizens Wishing to be Heard Please State Name And Address
If the projects are built, in just over a decade passengers could
be riding trains from Atlanta to Cobb County or to Emory University,
or traveling new, swifter ramps through the Ga. 400/I-285 interchange,
or finding countless arterial roads wider and less clogged, from Henry
County to Cherokee County and all points in between.
Why, in the second decade of the 21st century,
do we continue with a failed traffic model from the
middle of the 20th century?
Seems to me traffic safety should be
pertinent and should include pedestrians.
and instead of
more unsafe roads
making life unpleasant and unsafe for communities,
we could go for
roads that serve communities.
“We are purchasing the property to the north, 5.22 acres, for $40,000
to reroute the road,” said County Manager Joe Pritchard.
Rerouting the road will cost approximately $300,000 versus at least
twice that amount to reinforce the hole, put in concrete supports,
and fill it to prevent the road from collapsing again.
LOWNDES COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS
PROPOSED AGENDA
WORK SESSION, MONDAY, AUGUST 22, 2011, 8:30 a.m.
REGULAR SESSION, TUESDAY, AUGUST 23, 2011, 5:30 p.m.
327 N. Ashley Street – 2nd Floor
Some of the other projects may also be boondoggles for all I know,
but at least all the ones to widen roads right to the north edge
of the county and thus drive development all the way into
agricultural and forest areas are gone.
Here’s the list:
Continue reading →
What are some ideas for economic and cultural growth that don’t require huge population growth? Richard Florida has many ideas for large and mid-sized population areas in the article discussed below. Who’s the Richard Florida for places the size of Lowndes County?
There are many jobs in this.
The
Five Points redevelopment
is an example of what she’s talking about.
It’s a lot better than building more sprawl:
safer, less expensive, more jobs, less energy cost, more energy independence,
better health, and more community.
Georgia Tech Professor Ellen Dunham-Jones spole January 2010 at TEDxAtlanta,
Retrofitting suburbia
In the last 50 years, we’ve been building the suburbs with a lot of
unintended consequences. And I’m going to talk about some of those
consequences and just present a whole bunch of really interesting projects
that I think give us tremendous reasons to be really optimistic that
the big design and development project of the next 50 years is going
to be retrofitting suburbia. So whether it’s redeveloping dying malls
or re-inhabiting dead big-box stores or reconstructing wetlands out
of parking lots, I think the fact is, the growing number of empty and
under-performing, especially, retail sites throughout suburbia gives
us actually a tremendous opportunity to take our least-sustainable
landscapes right now and convert them into more sustainable places. And
in the process, what that allows us to do is to redirect a lot more of
our growth back into existing communities that could use a boost, and
have the infrastructure in place, instead of continuing to tear down
trees and to tear up the green space out at the edges.
Many T-SPLOST projects submitted by Lowndes County would make traffic safety
worse.
More from Professor Ellen Dunham-Jones of Georgia Tech:
Even Buford Highway, she says, could be transformed with medians,
trees and buildings set closer to the road. Changes that are known
to slow traffic. But outside of the ivory tower, change does not come
easily. Or quickly.
Last year Georgia spent more than two billion dollars on transportation,
but only a tiny fraction, less than 1 percent, went specifically to
pedestrian safety.
And what Lowndes County has sent in for T-SPLOST funding includes:
Solar Roadways received a $750,000 grant from the Federal Highway
Administration to build a parking lot paved with solar panels.
Last year the green infrastructure company demoed a 12 square-foot
prototype of its solar road as phase 1 of this new technology. The
prototype was made up of solar panels, heating elements, and a grid of
wireless LED lights encased in durable glass that has the same traction
as asphalt and doesn’t cause glare. The panels generate a total of 7.6
kilowatt hours of electricity per day that can be used to melt snow and
ice, spell warnings for motorists, or be connected to weight sensitive
panels that illuminate a crosswalk when activated. The solar road can
also be connected to a smart grid to power nearby homes and businesses,
or even electric cars.
Traffic on Old Pine will be regulated by the amount of people who
use the highway;
traffic on Bemiss since you and I moved out there forty years ago.
…
I’m not going to argue Bemiss Highway, it’s not a pertinent fact.
That’s right, traffic and traffic safety are considered not pertinent
to building subdivisions, according to the Chairman of the Lowndes County
Commission, and the actions of the Commissioners and staff.
The developer gets to consider only their one property and
the neighbors get to deal with all the effects on all the related roads.
Privatization of profits and socialization of problems
such as traffic accidents.
Does that seem right to you?
If not, it’s going to go on until more people argue and
debate.
In fact, many of Lowndes County’s T-SPLOST tax request would make the problem worse.
See
next post.
The Southern Georgia Regional Transportation Roundtable has set a series of public meetings to review the Draft Constrained Investment List for the following counties, representing the Special District for a proposed transportation sales and use tax: Atkinson, Bacon, Ben Hill, Berrien, Brantley, Brooks, Charlton, Clinch, Coffee, Cook, Echols, Irwin, Lanier, Lowndes, Pierce, Tift, Turner, and Ware.
