After decades of controversies and false starts, a route has been selected for a planned road that would provide more access to Anchorage's U-Med District -- an area that includes the University of Alaska Anchorage and Alaska Pacific University campuses, and the expanding Providence Alaska Medical Center campus. The selected route (called the "orange route" by engineers) will connect Elmore Road with South Bragaw Road. The two-lane roadway would extend Elmore Road seven-tenths of a mile north through the wooded area between the university campuses. It is estimated to cost $19.4 million.
The project's engineers, DOWL HKM, said the route will remain open to a public comment period before any ground is broken on the project. A community meeting is planned for Tuesday, Feb, 18, from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. at East Anchorage High School. No end date for comments has been announced. Construction is expected to begin in 2015.
The road has had a long and winding journey in its inception and planning. The project has been opposed by local community councils and is the subject of a funding recall effort in Juneau. The Anchorage community councils of Rogers Park, Airport Heights, and University Area have passed resolutions opposing the road plan. Some of the opposition dates back to the inception of the idea to make a north-south connection between Tudor Road and East Northern Lights Boulevard -- first proposed by then-Mayor Tom Fink in the late 1980s. But a 2011 reconnaissance report found that the road is critical to the district, which is Anchorage's fastest-growing employment center, already home to 11 percent of the city's workforce. The area includes Providence Alaska Medical Center, both UAA and APU campuses, and a range of medical specialty businesses. A new 5,000-seat UAA sports arena being built in the area and expected to be complete in June is only expected to add more congestion to local arteries and connector streets that are already over capacity at peak times.
"There is an average of 9,000 cars per day driving down UAA Drive (the main access point into the district); this road won't eliminate that traffic, but it will certainly ease it," Dowl-HKM project manager Stewart Osgood said.
In 2013, the Alaska Legislature -- at the request of Anchorage Mayor Dan Sullivan -- approved $20 million in funding to build the road. Four alternative routes were selected and on Thursday, they were whittled down to one. Since the 2011 study found the road was a critical need for the area, the option to do nothing -- as some have suggested -- was not considered by the State of Alaska Department of Transportation and Municipality of Anchorage, which both support the project. Thursday's route selection came as a bitter disappointment to some Anchorage community councils that have opposed the project.
"Most people call it 'the cut-through' because it is a cut -- more for people going from one end of town to the other -- and will not be used as access to the U-Med District," said Janet Bidwell, president of the Rogers Park Community Council, which has passed resolutions opposing any road plan in the area.
The roadway would enter the wooded area at the south end of South Bragaw Road, near East High School. Increased traffic in the area is a concern for people living there.
"AHCC (Airport Heights Community Council) wants the existing trails and open space to be preserved," AHCC president John Witlock said. "We are also concerned about the impact to pedestrians -- particularly students who attend East High School -- of additional roadways at the intersection of Northern Lights Boulevard and Bragaw Street."
The roadway would also cut through popular running and skiing trails in the UAA/APU area. Project managers said Thursday those areas are not designated park land and they would try to work around as many local trails as possible for the road's final design. But many people who live in the area said they don't want to see the road disturb what is one of the city's largest green spaces.
"Our initial take is that we prefer no development at all, and seeing this come through is an extreme disappointment," University Area Community Council president Jacob Gondek said.
And Bidwell and Whitlock are not alone in their opposition to the road plan. In January, Sen. Berta Gardner, D-Anchorage, and Rep. Andy Josephson, D-Anchorage, filed legislation to repeal the $20 million in state funding already approved for the U-Med/Northern Access Road project. Gardner and Josephson represent the university area, which would be affected by the proposed road. Their bill, however, appears to have little chance of success in a legislature that just approved the money for the project last year.
According to the Alaska Department of Transportation and the Municipality of Anchorage, the road design is only 20 percent done. For now, it calls for an 80-foot-wide easement through UAA-owned land between South Bragaw Street and Elmore Road. The easement would include two lanes with in-street bike lanes. The speed limit would be 30 mph. A separate path for walking, hiking and winter sports would run along the eastern side of the roadway. The plan calls for up to three roundabouts to move and control traffic. Three crossings (most likely to be pedestrian bridges) would allow foot and bike traffic to move over the roadway safely.
The route selected does face some construction challenges. The soil in the area is swampy and already has gas, sewer and communication lines run through it. Some of the utility lines would have to be dug up and replaced, according to state transportation officials. Project managers said Thursday that any impact to wetlands would be mitigated through construction or a payment in lieu of mitigation. But changes can still be made to the plan.
The route selection phase of the project received more than 200 written public comments, according to Dowl-HKM. And the public comment process remains open.
"The project gets better the more the public is involved," Jim Amundsen, chief of DOT's highway design group said.
This is a developing story. Check back for updates.
Contact Sean Doogan at sean@alaskadispatch.com.