Meadow Creek Parkway: Rubber hits road

What's next?

With the longest portion of the Meadow Creek Parkway open and now doing business as the John W. Warner Parkway, when will commuters be able to continue their 35mph, two-lane journey from CATEC on Rio Road on into downtown Charlottesville?

If all goes well, the rest of the road will be finished late 2014, but in a project that's taken 44 years already, there's no reason to assume all will go well.

For one thing, there's that pesky lawsuit the Coalition to Preserve McIntire Park filed against the Federal Highway Administration, alleging that putting a road through McIntire Park violates Section 4(f) of the Department of Transportation Act of 1966, which basically says federal dollars can't be used to take publicly owned parkland or historic sites unless there is no other feasible and prudent alternative.

The coalition is waiting on a ruling from federal Judge Norman Moon, says bypass opponent Rich Collins, who erroneously believed the Meadow Creek Parkway had been torpedoed in the past.

In 1999, City Council put a number of conditions on the parkway, including two-lanes rather than four, no truck traffic, and a requirement for bike lanes and trails.

But what opponents thought would sink the project for sure, recalls Collins, was City Council's requirement that there be a grade-separated interchange at McIntire Road and the U.S. 250 bypass, making the project prohibitively expensive.

That's when Albemarle supervisor Forrest Marshall appealed to  Senator John Warner to earmark $27 million for the project– later reduced to $24 million– and suddenly in 2005 the parkway was alive again.

The interchange is the crucial piece that determines when the whole thing opens. Even though the city's .4 mile section of McIntire Road Extended is underway and targeted for completion by the end of 2013, that stretch can't open until the interchange is built– unlike Albemarle's "Warner" section, which with connections to existing roads, could open independently.

Right now, Charlottesville is procuring rights-of-way for the interchange, according to Angela Tucker, who's in charge of the project for the city. The skateboard park's days along McIntire Road are numbered, and she's working with the Department of Parks & Recreation to find it a new home.

Also needed is construction authorization from the Federal Highway Administration– the same agency that's being sued by the Coalition to Save McIntire Park.

And that's why there's no firm date to begin the final segment of the Meadow Creek Parkway.

Three uneasy pieces

John W. Warner Parkway
Location: Albemarle County, from East Rio Road to Melbourne Road
Length: 1.4 miles
Cost: $24.3 million
Construction began: February 2009
Completed: October 13, 2011
Opened: January 6, 2012

McIntire Road Extended
Location: Charlottesville, from Melbourne to U.S. 250 bypass
Length: .4 mile
Cost: $9.482 million
Construction began: August 2011
Estimated end: Summer 2013

Meadow Creek Parkway interchange
Location: McIntire Road from Harris Street to 750 feet north of the US. 250 bypass
Length: .5 mile
Cost: $33 million
Federal earmark: $24 million
Estimated start: Late spring 2012
Estimated completion: late 2014

Total cost: $66.78 million
 Length: 2.3 miles
 ––>Price/mile: $29 million