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Home » 2015-05-09 election » Montgomery County » $350 Mil Road Bond » Montgomery County Transportation Plans

The proponents and opponents of the bond seem to have differing views over whether there is a county-wide transportation plan and whether it is being followed. An extensive search of the Internet and efforts to obtain plans via the County Commissioners have resulted in the following list of plans, each with their own set of problems.

Current Thoroughfare Plan

The Commissioners Court argues that there is a Thoroughfare Plan and that it is currently being updated. The reality is that the current plan has not been properly maintained and it does not qualify as true plan.

The current plan is woefully out-of-date. When the project was being approved Judge Craig Doyal (then Commissioner Doyal) admitted that the last thoroughfare plan the county conducted was in 1985. Since then there have been a couple of updates to the plan, but this is the first major revisiting of the entire plan.^[2] To put this in context, Montgomery County had a population of roughly 150,000 in 1985^[3]. Basing a $350 million bond proposal on a 30 year old plan is rather unwise. Proposing such a bond months prior to such a major update is inexplicable. Lack of leadership in this county has been problematic and we're seeing the results of the years of the lack of plans and patchwork fixes.

Current Thoroughfare Plan; click http://usvotesmart.com/images/e/ee/Montgomery_County_Thoroughfare_Plan.png for larger version.

In addition, the existing "plan" is not really a plan. When we found the plan online, we thought it was just the title page; however, after contacting Judge Doyal to provide clarification, it appears that the Thoroughfare Plan amounts to one map of the county with some lines drawn on it. Showing existing or proposed, with vast stretches of the county without any thoroughfares for miles. Since then, Judge Doyal's office has come out with an "interactive plan", which initially featured Hwy. 99 (Grand Parkway, a Tx-Dot project), as a key project in the Rayford Rd. corridor. In turn, they also omitted Rayford Rd., which is the biggest project on the bond!

Houston Plan

Lest there be any confusion in what a proper thoroughfare plan should look like and contain, all one needs to do is to look at our neighbors. The Houston Thoroughfare Plan Map is available online. At first it may look somewhat similar - a map. But there are several features on this map that aren't present on the Montgomery County Map, including:

A complete plan showing a vision of how undeveloped areas will be developed, including roughly one-mile spacing between major thoroughfares (in fact, just about the only areas that do not have the one mile-spacing defined are the portions of Montgomery County shown on the map!)
A classification of each roadway segment into:
- Freeway
- Major Thoroughfare
- Major Collector
- Minor Collector
- Local
Identification of right-of-way status as:
- Sufficient
- To be widened
- To be acquired

In addition, Houston's plan includes backup information in a table with 1,802 entries that identifies each segment of each Collector/Thoroughfare with the current number of lanes and the current right-of way. This gives a thorough view of how the each corridor will eventually develop into a comprehensive network of mobility.

In short, the Houston Plan allows one to see what is envisioned plan (which is a coherent grid network) and to understand how wide a street is likely to be widened to - even if they don’t own the right-of-way today. And the information is all online and public and updated annually.

Fort Bend County Plan

But perhaps you only see these details because Houston is so developed. We can also look at the Plan for Fort Bend County - a county with a similar population, similar growth rate, and has to work through the Houston-Galveston Area Council (HGAC) as we do. Their plan contains much of the same information as the Houston Plan:

A complete plan covering the entire county at roughly one-mile spacing (except for flood plain areas)
Classification of each roadway, similar to Houston
Identification of each roadway as proposed or existing

And like Houston's plan, it is up-to-date (2015).

Summary

When compared to real thoroughfare plans, it is clear that Montgomery County does not have anything that comes close. This does not mean that we have to define one-mile grid design for the county; to the contrary, the Montgomery County plan should reflect the needs and desires of its citizens. But once again, Montgomery County fails. It has not consulted its citizens on what they would like to see in a plan.

2015 Montgomery County "Thoroughfare Plan"

Montgomery County is currently updating its out-of-date Montgomery County Mobility - Thoroughfare Plan. While this is commendable, there are still serious problems with this project.

Firstly, the development of the plan is delayed for unknown reasons. The study began in March 2014 and was supposed to be complete in February 2015^[4]; it is now scheduled to have only a draft in the summer of 2015, but as the presenter of the "Plan" said, "don't hold me to that".^[5]

Secondly, this plan is not being developed with any public input. The April 8 report to the Commissioners Court listed a number of inputs into the report, including:^[6]

Traffic counts
Demographic data
Economic data
Crash data
Proposed developments
Trip generators
Natural barriers
Man-made barriers
Existing and Planned Roadways
South County Mobility Plan
Comprehensive Plans from municipalities

As noted above, citizen input was not included. Further, despite being a year into the project, there have been no public meetings to discuss any details about the development of this plan. Even at the April 8, 2015 presentation, there were no details or draft ideas presented as to what would be proposed. At best, the plan appears to be under development by a group of academics that are keeping their cards close to their chest. But it would not be surprising to see such an opaque project that proposes exactly what the Commissioners want. Montgomery County deserves an open process, not one controlled by a select group of people.

Thirdly, the report to the Commissioners Court gave no indication that it would be a thorough plan along the lines of Houston or Fort Bend. This is a critical problem. Thoroughfares, particularly Principle Thoroughfares, need to be planned early because the concept of a thoroughfare is that it can carry a considerable amount of traffic over a considerable distance. Unfortunately, designing these roads will already be a major challenge because of the way development has already occurred. Many existing thoroughfares currently 'T" off onto other streets. Many of these should be designed to continue - but in many cases, new residential developments have recently been built blocking any reasonable continuation of the roadway. A classic example of this is about to occur at 1488 to the east of I-45. Currently the land to the east is undeveloped, but there are already plans to build a residential community blocking the natural path of such a major road. Our #1 priority in a bond should be to develop a real, community-consensus, plan.

According to the H-GAC testimony given to the Commissioners Court, without the benefit of a proper thoroughfare plan, the county does not know where it needs to preserve right-of-way or where near-term improvements are best made ^[7]. As an example of this, the Houston Plan reveals what appears to be differing concepts between what Montgomery County is planning and what Houston is planning in the Kingwood area. Houston's plan calls for extending the West Lake Houston Parkway, whereas Montgomery County is proposing a study on Ford Road, which is a quarter mile away from the proposed alignment for the proposed Lake Houston Parkway. We desperately need to plan before we waste more money.

In short, approving the bond to fund "future needs" for areas of the county where a study has not been completed is simply unwise.

South County Mobility Study

In contrast to the Thoroughfare Plan, the South County Mobility Study^[8] was developed with public input and has produced both near-term and long-term maps showing various improvements, including proposed number of lanes on each roadway. In addition to the near-term and long-term maps, a report is provided giving even more details about each proposed improvement.

What is notable from this plan is the number of short-term needs that are not included in the current bond proposal while many projects without justification are included. Missing projects include:

Precinct 2

Widening of Hwy. 242 to true 6 lanes(plus a shoulder), from Gosling to I-45(in the new hospital district, as well as Lone Star College, Walmart & Costco)
Adding two more through lanes on FM 1488, 1/4 mile on either side of the FM 2978 intersection
Widening of Sendera Ranch Rd. for approximately 1.5 miles, starting at Fish Creek Thoroughfare(FCT) at Fish Creek above it and the juncture with FM 2978 and Honea Egypt below it
Bridge on FCT over Hwy. FM 2854 and a new, safer interchange
Widening of McCaleb Rd., north of FCT from FM 2854 to Hwy 105.

Precinct 3

Birnham Woods (Rayford Corridor)
Elan Blvd. (Rayford Corridor)

Precinct 4

Extending Songwood Drive
Connecting Oak Ridge School Road to Johnson Rd

H-GAC 2035 Plan

The Houston-Galveston Area Council has a 2035 plan^[9] for the Houston metropolitan region. While the region has planned for this timeframe, the plan for Montgomery County is very limited. There are only three projects identified for the 2025-2035 period, when Montgomery County is projected to add roughly 300,000 residents. These three projects total roughly 5 miles of roadway and a new interchange at I-69 and The Grand Parkway. In the meantime, the plan fails to identify any major east-west thoroughfare, such as a freeway, despite the fact that the population will likely be over a million people by 2035.

In short, the HGAC Plan demonstrates how little planning has been done in Montgomery County and how desperately we need a real community-consensus plan.