EDITORIAL: Massive road fix for I-465 and I-69 is only temporary

The IBJ

   Anyone who regularly travels the busy northeast-side stretches of interstates 69 and 465 knows what a nightmare they can be during peak commute times. Those roads haven't seen any significant improvement in decades even though the surrounding population has exploded.

   The transformation of places such as Noblesville and Fishers from sleepy bedroom communities into major population centers might warrant the $600 million road makeover the state now is considering. Adding lanes and reconfiguring interchanges should get traffic moving again-at least in the short term-and the solutions being considered are probably the quickest fixes available.
   But state transportation planners and the general public are fooling themselves if they think this major road project by itself will be anything more than a Band-Aid for what ails northeast-side commuters.
   It does nothing to address the needs of major employers who for years have been calling for alternative travel options for employees who don't have reliable car transportation.
   And even the most hardened road advocates note that the plan being considered won't improve I-69 bottlenecks at 96th and 116th streets. An Indiana Department of Transportation official said those improvements will come in subsequent phases, which raises questions about how many more hundreds of millions of dollars it will take to adequately address congestion on the northeast side.
   Time is another concern. The project now being considered likely wouldn't start before 2012. Factor in subsequent phases and it's not hard to envision a time line stretching out 10 or 15 years.
   Perhaps more troubling is that the plan seems to blithely ignore what study after study has shown: Road expansions tend to generate more traffic without enhancing economic activity. The added traffic eventually clogs roads once again, leaving commuters and planners with the same predicament they just spent millions of dollars solving.
   We share Hamilton County Commissioner Christine Altman's desire that the state abandon its "roads only" approach to transportation planning.
   We also agree with State Sen. Luke Kenley, the Noblesville Republican, who notes that the local culture revolves around the car, not alternative methods of transportation. But that isn't likely to change as long as cars are the only option.
   As the Central Indiana Transit Authority and the Metropolitan Planning Organization prepare to release a preferred route and mode of public transportation for the northeast corridor, we'd at least like to hear some acknowledgement from INDOT that the massive I-69/I-465 project is being planned with future rapid transit in mind.
   Other cities our size have built or are planning light rail systems to ease congestion and give commuters options. The Indianapolis region should do the same.