Hurdles just starting for Mark Clark

Extension must win funding, permits and council's support Completing the final leg of the Mark Clark Expressway would ease traffic congestion for those who drive Main Road on Johns Island or Maybank Highway on James Island. If the road were completed, the number of cars driving those stretches each day would drop by about 5,000 or, in some cases, by as many as 20,000. The project, which would build a new stretch of interstate highway from Citadel Mall to the James Island Expressway, also would help motorists who regularly drive along Folly Road from the James Island Connector into West Ashley, and it promises to lighten traffic on Savannah Highway. Still, this new stretch of Interstate 526 - a $420 million project that Charleston County Council is asking the state to complete -won't help everyone. In fact, it promises to worsen congestion in some areas. Those driving on Maybank Highway on Johns Island could see more delays, as traffic counts between River and Bohicket roads would rise from about 26,000 a day to more than 38,000 a day by the year 2030. And the effects go beyond the sea islands: S.C. Highway 61, Sam Rittenberg Boulevard, Montague Avenue and Interstate 26 also would see more cars each day, though their increases wouldn't be as dramatic as the improvements to Main Road. These figures come from a new computer model unveiled earlier this year by the Berkeley-Charleston-Dorchester Council of Governments, which handles the Lowcountry's regional highway plan. The model uses traffic counts, Census data and information on new developments to forecast how building a certain highway will affect other roads. 'We feel relatively good about the projections,' COG planner Haila Maze said. Some, including Coastal Conservation League director Dana Beach, are using the model to question whether it's a mistake to complete the Mark Clark's last leg. 'For a half a billion dollars, what you get is better better, worse worse, better better better, worse worse worse. For half a billion dollars,' he said. 'I just think this is a moment in time for our region, and we just need to be more intelligent and analytical when we look at this project. You've got a choice between good and evil here, between doing things that got us into the sprawl we have today and that will make it worse and doing something different.' A done deal? County Council already has agreed to ask the State Infrastructure Bank for $420 million to build the Mark Clark and for $300 million to build a port access road between Interstate 26 and the former Navy base. The Mark Clark project has been in the works since 1970, but other sections of Interstate 526 have taken priority, and there's been little momentum to complete it in the past decade. That changed in November 2004, when county voters approved raising the sales tax by 1/2 a percentage point to raise $1.3 billion for new roads, bridges, public transit and preserving open space. While the sales tax has resuscitated the Mark Clark, those involved say it's far from a done deal. First, the State Infrastructure Bank has to agree, which is not guaranteed, even though Charleston County Administrator Roland Windham noted the Mark Clark is the last unbuilt section of interstate highway in South Carolina. Second, the state must get the necessary environmental permits to build the road, and it would be expected to face stiff opposition from Beach and potentially hundreds of Johns Island residents who fear the road will change their island's rural character. And finally, the project must continue to maintain County Council's support. While Council Chairman Leon Stavrinakis helped spearhead the Infrastructure Bank request, he could change his mind. 'I'm not married to the Mark Clark project or any other project if I think it will do more damage than good,' Stavrinakis said. Stavrinakis noted the Mark Clark project was selected for the bank application not because an analysis showed spending the money there would do the most good countywide, but because it was a high-dollar project believed to have the most appeal to the state. Council's 5-3 vote on the application reflected members' own ambivalence, as well as the controversy attached to the other application, that of a new port access road between Interstate 26 and the former Charleston Naval Base. Councilwoman Colleen Condon was one of the dissenters. 'I just think there are a lot of projects that have proven benefits and folks in the area want it. I'd rather work on those projects first, even if that means leaving some State Infrastructure Bank money on the table.' The state's role The State Infrastructure Bank is scheduled to meet Dec. 15 in Columbia to begin considering the county's request and requests from other counties. Bank chairman Don Leonard said there's little he can say about the county's chances, partly because he hasn't seen the application and partly because it's unclear exactly how much money the bank will have to spend. 'It appears we're going to have requests for more funds than we have the capacity to finance,' he said. 'We're just in the process to determine all that.' Tony Fallaw, program manager with the state Department of Transportation, said if the bank were to find the dollars for the Mark Clark, the state would resume work on getting the permit to build it. Some permit work cranked up about a decade ago but later fizzled. At the time, many still opposed the Mark Clark because of fears that it would bring sprawl to Johns Island. Those fears remain, but the county now has sales tax money to protect rural land. County Council has asked its Greenbelt Advisory Board and its consultants to look at how greenbelt dollars could help. Fallaw said once work resumes on permitting the Mark Clark, it would take about a year to get to a public hearing, then another four months to settle on the exact alignment or path of the road. It then would take another year and a half to buy the necessary right of way and another two or three years to build it. All told, the earliest anyone would drive on the road would probably be 2011. The county's role While the county already has decided to seek money for the Mark Clark, the debate is just beginning. The county's Transportation Advisory Board is putting together a countywide plan and still plans to look at the relative merits of the Mark Clark project, chairman John Knott said. 'There's some major controversy over the Mark Clark and some other projects,' he said, and the embers of that controversy will be fanned if the board's plan, due to be completed next year, shows there are better ways to spend $420 million. Beach is convinced it will. He said Johns Island's traffic problems might be better solved by a series of smaller improvements such as widening or adding turn lanes to Bohicket and Main roads. He also notes that current traffic models don't anticipate the new development that will occur if certain highways are improved or built. Meanwhile, the county also will study how it can use its greenbelt dollars to protect Johns Island from a surge in additional development that the Mark Clark could bring. Stavrinakis and others, including Charleston Mayor Joe Riley, have said their support for the interstate is contingent on giving Johns Island added protection from its impact. Even so, many on Johns Island are ambivalent about the Mark Clark. Phil Dustan is one of them. 'It doesn't appear that the connector really solves the Johns Island traffic problem. It just shifts it around,' he said. 'It would be nice to be able to jump on the Mark Clark and zip into the city in six minutes. That's great, but it's going to foster much more development on the island.' Dustan said growing up, he watched as the Long Island Expressway in New York went from a major new highway designed to solve that island's traffic woes to a congested parking lot. 'It didn't solve any problems. I think we can be smarter than that 40 years later,' he said. 'It's sort of typical of government not to be fully informed before they ask for money. I am disappointed in the fact that these people should have a little more foresight and learn from the past.' Depending on what the county's transportation and greenbelt boards come up with, the Mark Clark could be viewed in a different light. 'It's hard to imagine that we're going to decide suddenly that the Mark Clark is a bad project,' Stavrinakis said. 'Are there remedial impacts that we need to address? Yes. I won't consent to starting or completing the project until those potential problems are addressed, particularly on Johns Island. Am I open to the possibility it could do more harm than good? Yes, but I find that hard to believe.'

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