Kyle ranks 7 priorities for road improvements

Top 7 projects Last week, the Kyle City Council submitted a priority order for road work to the Capital Area Metropolitan Planning Organization, a board that controls millions in federal and state transportation money. The city estimated that CAMPO would cover about 80 percent of the cost of six of the seven projects, while estimating that CAMPO would cover a little more than 70 percent of the planned expansion of Marketplace Avenue.

1. Rebuild Bunton Lane and Goforth Road and add center turn lane from the Interstate 35 frontage road to Lehman High School. CAMPO rank: 59 of 179 projects in the area. Cost: $5.0 million

2. Rebuild Burleson Street with center turn lane. CAMPO rank: 52 of 179. Cost: $5.3 million

3. Rebuild Lehman Road with center turn lane. CAMPO rank: 67 of 179. Cost: $5.8 million

4. Rebuild Goforth Road with center turn lane from IH-35 frontage road to Bunton Road. CAMPO rank: 60 of 179. Cost: $5.1 million

5. Construct sidewalks and bike lanes from FM 150 at Burleson Street to FM 2770 at Hays High School. CAMPO rank: 18 of 179. Cost: $963,000

6. Build sidewalks on FM 150 East from Interstate 35 to Hemphill El- ementary School. CAMPO rank: 43 of 179. Cost: $1.1 million

7. Connect Burleson Street with Marketplace Avenue. CAMPO rank: 118 of 179. Cost: $4 million  

A Central Texas planning board is considering a proposal to improve one or more of Kyle’s roads with state and federal money. The Capital Area Metropolitan Planning Organization gets to decide whether Bunton, Burleson, Lehman or Goforth will be repaved and expanded. Or if something else will happen. Or if anything will happen at all. CAMPO previously said that the city might get money for a road project or two. But the powerful board wanted to know: What would the city prefer to do first? It wasn’t an easy question to answer. A committee that advises the board had put Kyle’s road projects in a possible order. The message was: This is what we think we can do for you, but tell us what you would like. So that was the question in the air at last week’s council meeting. Before the members settled on the order shown here, they had to weigh what was most possible against what was most appealing. The most possible, according to the advisory committee, was building sidewalks and bike lanes along farm-to-market roads 150 and 2270. The most appealing was to fix, well, anything else. Mayor Pro Tem David Wilson was on the side of possibility. He wanted the sidewalks because, he said, “Children walk to school in the ditches.” He also wanted something that the committee had ranked pretty low, meaning that the board might not give it a chance: the construction of Marketplace Avenue. Because there was a “shovel-ready” plan, and money was available from a developer, Marketplace seemed quite possible to him. “It just makes sense to take care of a traffic volume and safety issues as well as these sidewalks,” he said. “Improvement of Burleson (Street) is also important. This is not saying that Lehman Road is not important. But there is an order in which you do things.” The others found fault with his order. What about Lehman, Bunton and Goforth? Weren’t those more important than sidewalks and a road that doesn’t even exist yet? “I just feel that you’re circumventing our entire capital improvement plan by recommending these projects that we haven’t discussed at length,” said Mayor Lucy Johnson. “I really can’t say anything else than the absolute need for Burleson, Bunton and Goforth to be repaved.” And so the order that the council approved was guided less by Wilson’s sense of possibility than by the mayor’s “absolute need.” Russ Huebner made the motion that passed as a unanimous resolution: Bunton, Burleson, Lehman and Goforth, in that order. Then the sidewalks. Then Marketplace. Wilson said, “I appreciate the motion.” Last week, the Kyle City Council submitted a priority order for road work to the Capital Area Metropolitan Planning Organization, a board that controls millions in federal and state transportation money. The city estimated that CAMPO would cover about 80 percent of the cost of six of the seven projects, while estimating that CAMPO would cover a little more than 70 percent of the planned expansion of Marketplace Avenue.