BY KEITH BENMAN, Times of Northwest Indiana
kbenman@nwitimes.com
HAMMOND | Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels on Tuesday said construction on the long-sought Illiana Expressway could begin within three years if it is built and run as a private toll road.
The governor told the Hammond Rotary that an agreement recently signed between Indiana and Illinois to study proposed routes is the first step in getting the project done.
At the same time, the governor said he wants to start seeking a private partner to build and operate the road, so a successful bidder can be on board by the time the study is completed.
"They would have the most powerful incentive possible to get the road finished because anyone that puts the money up wouldn't get a nickel until the road is finished," Daniels later told The Times editorial board.
The Illiana Expressway would connect Interstate 57 in Illinois with Interstate 65, the Indiana Toll Road, and Interstate 94 in Michigan City.
The toll road as outlined by the governor would consist of 50 miles in Indiana and 13 in Illinois. Indiana will lead the bistate study, which will cost between $5 million and $10 million.
The governor is fresh off his successful effort to lease the Indiana Toll Road, which netted the state $3.8 billion. It was the largest privatization of an existing toll road in U.S. history.
Illinois has reacted more cooly to the idea of private toll roads, with Gov. Rod Blagojevich adamantly opposed to tolls for another bistate project -- a new Mississippi River bridge Illinois is negotiating with Missouri.
An Illinois Department of Transportation spokesman contacted Tuesday confirmed there is a bistate agreement on studying routes and feasibility for the Illiana Expressway. But building it with private funds and operating it as a toll road is another matter.
"We are both committed to doing the study," said Mike Claffey, an IDOT spokesman. "But no decision has been made on how it will be funded."
Gov. Daniels' office issued a clarification at 5:30 p.m. that "the reference in the news release to the use of private funds to build the Illiana Expressway and operate it as a toll road pertains only to the Indiana portion of the project."
U.S. Rep. Jerry Weller, R-Ill., a vocal Illiana Expressway advocate, recently said a right-of-way has to be preserved for the Illiana Expressway before any decisions can be made on how to pay for it.
Daniels said he will seek legislation in the next session of the Indiana General Assembly authorizing the private development of the Illiana Expressway. He hopes to get the same authorization for the proposed Indiana Commerce Connector in that bill. That toll road would link Interstate 69 and Interstate 70 south and east of Indianapolis.
"At this point there is a very strong belief this thing would work. But there's only one way to find out," Daniels said.
When Daniels successfully drove the Indiana Toll Road lease home, he had Republican majorities to work with in both houses. Now, only the Senate has a GOP majority.
Daniels kicked off his campaign for a privately built and operated Illiana Expressway at the noon luncheon of the Rotary at Purdue University Calumet's Alumni Hall.
"It's a conversation between doers and doubters, between builders and bad-mouthers," Daniels told about 90 Rotarians.
He made it clear the Illiana Expressway would be run under a lease arrangement, where the state would retain the title to the underlying land. He later compared the private operation of the roadway to that of a public utility.
The biggest benefit of the Illiana Expressway would lie in the congestion relief the 63-mile toll road would provide, Daniels said. He said one study has estimated an Illiana Expressway would reduce truck traffic by 59 percent on U.S. 30 and by 22 percent on the Borman Expressway.
The roadway also will be key to attracting intermodal rail yards to Northwest Indiana, where cargo containers could be off-loaded for truck shipment to Chicago and beyond.
"If we could do that in Northwest Indiana we could create thousands of jobs," Daniels said.