See the eight designs for the inner belt bridge here.
The Ohio Department of Transportation is planning a massive redesign of the I-90 inner belt, running from Metro Health center all the way to Dead Man's Curve. ODOT Director Gordon Proctor says with just fewer than 800 auto accidents a year, it's the most dangerous section of highway in the State.
Gordon Proctor: This is really what I call a re-calibration of the road network in Cleveland. It's trying to take care of the environmental aspirations of opening up the shoreway, the economic aspirations of the opening up the Opportunity Corridor, redesigning the inner belt to address the congestions the safety and aesthetic problems that it has.
ODOT says its plan would make the inner belt safer by closing access at Carnegie and Prospect avenues. The agency acknowledges this will require the demolition of 19 businesses and some business leaders say these changes will hurt economic development rather than promote it. Here's Jim Haviland of Midtown Cleveland.
Jim Haviland: We've got to get back on the table this idea of a Carnegie exit, which was engineered by ODOT and dismissed only because they thought there was a redundant exit at 22nd Street.
Haviland says Midtown Cleveland has its own traffic models that show congestion on city streets will increase if these exits are removed. But ODOT's Gordon Proctor contends that keeping those exits is a risk to lives and the economy.
Gordon Proctor: Having a bottle neck as your front door, it not good for the economy. Look at the totality of the packages, and clearly the Opportunity Corridor is a economic development project.
The so-called Opportunity Corridor is a proposed plan to bring highway access to University Circle. It's the example Proctor uses to buttress his claim that ODOT's construction plans will stimulate Cleveland's economy. But when pressed on details, he acknowledges that ODOT will not finance the Corridor's construction.
Gordon Proctor: We have no construction dollars committed to the Opportunity Corridor. We put in the $5 million for the planning and I think we're quite up front with the business community and... that they might have to look at tax increment financing and other things to help pay for the cost of that project.
On the other hand, ODOT has secured half of the $800 million needed to pay for the Inner Belt Project. Officials say the bridge - which is the centerpiece of the project - will break ground by October 2009. That means a bridge design must be chosen this year. At a public hearing last night in Tremont, eight bridge types were put on the drawing board. The first three options are made of concrete and steel. Their designs are subtle and meant to be unnoticeable against the Cleveland skyline.
Gordon Proctor: I doubt that too many people will be excited about it, but we will offer those three basic types as sort of a point of departure, in case the community wants a bridge that sort of blends into the background.
ODOT's five other bridge options are more modern and could add character to the Cleveland skyline. The city could pick an arch bridge, much like the current Hope Memorial Bridge, or opt for three variations on a cable-stayed bridge. That's a type of suspension bridge and ODOT is currently building one for Toledo. Another option is an extrados bridge, where the towers and cables supporting the bridge deck resemble the pointy back of a stegosaurus. Gordon Proctor says if Cleveland chooses this design, it would be the first one for Ohio.
Gordon Proctor: But they are rather expensive... and doesn't do much for the Cleveland skyline - it just kinda blends into it and these are rather costly.
ODOT's public meeting in Tremont last night kicks off a 30-day comment period for the bridge selection process. ODOT will return to the public in September with the design finalists. It hopes to have a bridge type selected by the end of 2006.
Lisa Ann Pinkerton, 90.3 News.