Road problem is alarming

We understand the difficulties.
But giving up on the Eastern Connector project would be a double blow to the community.

The Albemarle County supervisors seem to be saying they’d like to build the road — but can’t.
“We don’t want to be the one who puts the Eastern Connector idea away,” said Sally Thomas, but “[t]he chance of getting the money to do it in our lifetime is not that great,” added fellow Supervisor Dennis S. Rooker.
A consultant has come up with alignment options that range from $40 million to $169 million — at a time when revenues are declining overall and state and federal assistance for roads is especially on the wane.
Meanwhile, the area is becoming more developed — meaning both that there are more cars that need to be accommodated with road improvements, and more houses blocking potential routes for new roads.

“There aren’t a whole lot of empty spaces in the study area that we’re dealing with,” said Lewis Grimm, consultant with PBS&J, referring to historic sites and current development in the way of the road.
The Eastern Connector is envisioned as a link between the U.S. 250/
Interstate 64 area east of Charlottes-ville and the congested U.S. 29 north of the city. Albemarle and the state squandered their opportunity to build a true bypass many years ago, and a series of local road improvements for local traffic was offered as an alternative.

Charlottesville agreed, after intense debate and negotiation, to accept one of those roads, the Meadowcreek Parkway. The project, linking Rio Road to the U.S. 250 Bypass with a two-lane, limited-acces road,will partly solve the north/east access problem, but only by drawing some through traffic into an intersection near the city center.
Meadowcreek also eats up some city parkland (which has been compensated for with other acquisitions) and creates a large grade-separated interchange, which many residents did not want, at the congested U.S. 250 intersection.
Charlottesville accepted these burdens with the stipulation that the Eastern Connector be built, taking much of the through traffic out of the city and obligating Albemarle County to share the responsibility of hosting new roads.

And now, with the Meadowcreek Parkway on the way to construction, Albemarle says that the connector might not be built “in our lifetime”?
City residents and leaders can be forgiven if they feel not only cheated, but betrayed.
We stress: County leaders do not seem to be using road-building difficulties as an excuse for abandoning the connector. They do, however, say they’d like to get more traffic data and see whether proposed improvement to local transit might relieve some of the road congestion.
Charlottesville probably would have preferred the option of waiting for better mass transit too.
Albemarle has an obligation to its partner Charlottesville to build the Eastern Connector and an obligation to its own residents to provide the roads they need.

If it can be done, it should be done.