Transportation
During a planning retreat in February 2005, the Delta Regional Authority board voted to make transportation one of the authority's three major policy development areas along with health care and information technology. Shortly after that retreat, the authority contracted with a consortium of firms to assist the DRA with transportation planning.
The Delta Development Highway System plan was developed following input from transportation executives and local organizations in the eight states covered by the DRA. Public meetings were held throughout the region in the fall of 2006.
"This plan represents the culmination of thousands of hours of work by those of us at the Delta Regional Authority and some of our region's top transportation experts," says Pete Johnson of Clarksdale, Miss., the federal co-chairman of the DRA. "We thank the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which funded the plan. We also thank the local development districts and our other stakeholders in the region."
The consulting team consisted of Wilbur Smith Associates, the Michael Baker Corp. and Neel-Schaffer Inc. Staff members from the Federal Highway Administration and the Appalachian Regional Commission provided additional assistance.
"We worked for more than a year to agree on criteria and priorities," Johnson says. "Approved highway programs for each of our eight states were used in preparing a draft plan. The draft then was presented during public meetings in Alabama, Missouri, Louisiana, Mississippi and Tennessee. Local input was crucial to the development of the plan."
The plan was presented to the president and Congress.
The Delta Development Highway System consists of 3,843 miles of roads throughout the region. The estimated cost to complete the planned improvement projects for these roads is $18.5 billion. Of the roads in the plan, 27 percent provide four or more travel lanes already. The remainder are two-lane roads.
The number of miles in the plan for each state are:
- Alabama -- 383
- Arkansas -- 704
- Illinois -- 174
- Kentucky -- 230
- Louisiana -- 591
- Mississippi -- 753
- Missouri -- 566
- Tennessee -- 442
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