On Tuesday, UDOT and the state Transportation Commission declined to commit $100 million to the road - known alternately as the Vineyard Connector and the Eastlake Parkway - which would provide an alternative to Interstate 15 congestion, especially during a future reconstruction project.
Instead, the transportation officials decided to allocate $30 million to pay for land and a federally required environmental study of the Vineyard roadway.
The move is expected to get official approval today during a Transportation Commission meeting in St. George. The compromise decision emerged during a work session on how to spend the $1 billion Critical Highway Needs Fund, created under HB314 during this year's legislative session.
The bill, sponsored by Rep. Rebecca Lockhart, R-Provo, and Sen. Sheldon Killpack, R-Syracuse, emerged in the final days of the session and passed the final night with little public discussion. But behind closed doors, lawmakers including House Speaker Greg Curtis pressed to make the Vineyard road a top priority.
Property owner Anderson Development is a client of Curtis' law firm and is the only entity Curtis listed on his legislative conflict-of-interest form.
Glen Brown, then the Transportation Commission chairman, resisted the backroom dealing. He also objected to the HB314 provision that set aside a previous law's requirement that projects would receive funding only if they already appeared on the state's master plan and after the Transportation Commission had ranked them according to a rigorous evaluation.
The Eastlake Parkway first appeared on a regional long-range plan in May.
Last month, as part of a shake-up of boards, commissions and his own staff, Gov. John Huntsman Jr. appointed former Davis County lawmaker Stuart Adams to head the commission.
Brown, still a commission member, on Tuesday spoke out against putting the Vineyard Connector ahead of other projects already waiting for funding but agreed it made sense to get started on environmental studies and buying land.
"That would allow this project to continue forward, which I think makes sense if there's going to be development there," Brown said.
Carlos Braceras, UDOT deputy director, said Anderson must clear the 1,800-acre property of slag left over from Geneva's steel manufacturing. UDOT can use the slag as roadbed material, so a mutually beneficial cost-sharing agreement could result in Anderson contributing $8 million to $10 million for the parkway project, Braceras said.
One of Curtis' law partners, former 3rd District Judge Michael Hutchings, has said Anderson Development doesn't actually need the Vineyard Connector because reconstruction of Geneva Road already is planned and the property has easy access to Interstate 15.
Still, Hutchings emphasized UDOT needed to figure out what it would do so Anderson could proceed with a development plan it intends to present to Vineyard town officials this summer.
UDOT and the commission agreed to be somewhat conservative and spend $913 million of the available $1 billion on 18 of 19 projects on the wish list rather than obligate the entire $1 billion. Because the list actually totaled $1.09 billion, some projects had to be trimmed.
The first to go was $80 million for widening I-15 near Beck Street; commissioners and UDOT reasoned the project could be paid for out of another transportation fund. The officials then decided to carve $70 million out of the Vineyard road funding request rather than cut into the $130 million needed to build the Mountain View Corridor along 2100 North in Lehi.
That keeps Mountain View on track and cements UDOT's choice for the route, said project director Teri Newell.
Before any money can be spent from the fund, the Legislature's Executive Appropriations Committee needs to review it. Adams said if the legislators put the matter on their July agenda, UDOT would be able to get rolling on the projects by August with completion expected on all of them by 2011.
phenetz@sltrib.com
