Commission discusses possible segregation in new schools >>See page 5
Opinion: Diversity funding loss hits close to home >>See page 6
Armari Moore all-round man Tennessee needs >>See page 11
Annual Maintenance from poor road conditions • Courtsey of TRIP
Knoxville
Nashville Memphis VOC $516 Safety $225 Congestion $1,080 Total $1,821
VOC Safety Congestion Total
$239 $225 $1,168 $1,632
VOC $188 Safety $245 Congestion $849 Total $1,282
Chattanooga VOC $426 Safety $284 Congestion $730 Total $1,440
It’s going to be a costly ride Poor Tennessee road conditions subject of scrutiny Travis Dorman Contributor
Tennessee’s Department of Transportation maintains Tennessee’s roads the best it can with the resources it has, according to Community Relations Officer Mark Nagi. State legislators, however, are realizing that TDOT may not have enough. According to a January study conducted by TRIP, a transportation research group based in Washington D.C., 40 percent of major roads and highways in Tennessee have pavement surfaces in “poor, mediocre or fair condition,” due mostly to a lack of state funding.
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“The pavement condition data that we use comes from the Federal Highway Administration,” said Carolyn Kelly, associate director of research and communications at TRIP. “Each year, states are required to measure the smoothness of all their pavement and report it to the FHWA.” TRIP has estimated that deteriorating road conditions cost the average Knoxville driver $1,280 per year due to additional vehicle operating costs, car repairs from crashes and congestion-related fees. Knoxville boasts the lowest figure of the four analyzed cities: Chattanooga drivers pay $1,440 per year, Nashville drivers $1,628 and Memphis drivers shell out around $1,821 per year. Yet not everyone shared TRIP’s view of Tennessee’s roads. Deputy Governor Jim Henry depicted road conditions differently when he spoke during the Senate Transportation and Safety Committee on Monday. “The state spends the third least per person on its roads and bridges,” Henry said. “It’s ranked now as the third best transportation
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system in America.” Henry also acknowledged the cost of transportation projects tripling in the past 20 years. “This is a problem that’s not going to go away. It’s going to worsen … The cost of building and maintaining roads continues to increase, and the state’s not going to be able to budget or efficiency itself out of this problem,” Henry said. TDOT Commissioner John Schroer spoke after Henry and described TDOT’s approach to infrastructure. “We are a fix-it-first state. We want to make sure that our roads, our current capital and our investments are taken care of … You don’t want to build a swimming pool in your backyard if your roof leaks,” said Schroer. Schroer showed a graph of TDOT’s annual budget totals from 1987 to 2016. He pointed out that it increased from 1987 to 2006 but decreased or stayed the same from 2006 to 2016. See ROAD CONDITIONS on Page 3
Wednesday, January 27, 2016