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Ted Wright -- last update 9/6/2007 (& 9/9) (ChamberSept6-ODOT.html) www.cvilleok.com

Copyright 2007 -- Collinsville, Oklahoma

Collinsville Chamber of Commerce
Sept. 6, 2007
Oklahoma Transportation Report
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Chamber Heard From Director Of ODOT
Road & Bridge Status

Oklahoma Department of Transportation (ODOT) Director Gary Ridley was the guest speaker at the monthly luncheon meeting of the Collinsville Chamber of Commerce. Ridley spoke of Oklahoma legislative changes in recent years that are just beginning to help dig his department out of a hole after decades of "anemic" funding.

With ~67,000 bridges, Oklahoma has more bridges than most states. Current funding levels will likely allow improvements to only 480 of those bridges in the 8-year plan. Oklahoma is the 17th state in the number of total roadway miles. 25% of Oklahoma roads are classified in "critical" need of improvement. Some roads lack shoulders (like Highway 20) or need median barrier improvements to improve safety.

Gary Ridley
Fielding questions after his speech, Director Ridley discussed 670 miles of turnpikes (which are under the Turnpike Authority ... and not ODOT); federal gas taxes (for which Oklahoma is a "donor state" putting more into the federal trust fund than is returned to the state); ~47,000 miles of US interstate highways (which took 20 years to build ... compared to China which is currently building ~13,000 miles each year); truck traffic (which is expected to double in 20 years and triple in 30 years).
Prior to the Chamber meeting at the Library Thursday, a City Hall meeting with officials from the City, School, County, ODOT, and State Representative Earl Sears was held. They discussed options to extend the Collinsville S-Curve improvement (4-To-Fix) project by about 1600 feet to get the multi-lane pavement past the high school (to the edge of the cemetary instead of stopping at the nursing home east of the high school). All agreed this was the best opportunity to make the additional improvement but the cost of the extension was an unknown. ODOT funding for the additional right-of-way needed would be investigated before a final decision could be made. If the additional funding can not be found for this near-term project the next opportunity would be when Highway 20 is 4-laned out to Highway 75 which is currently in the 8-year plan in the 2012-2014 time frame.