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MDOT, communities celebrate conclusion of big projects · Talking Michigan Transportation

• 0:06
  SPEAKER_05: Hello, welcome to the Talking Musical Transportation Podcast.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_05: I'm Chuck Cranson.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_05: Over the next two installments of the podcast, I'll be focusing on some high-impact projects the department wrapped up this month with celebrations with a lot of community and political and business leaders.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_05: First, I spoke with Jill Bland, who is the executive vice president at Southwest Michigan First, about the completion of a long-awaited expansion of the US 131 interchange with US 131 business route, converting it to a full interchange, complete with new ramps that are open from westbound 131 business route to southbound 131 and from westbound northbound 131 to eastbound 131.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_05: This is a really important project in the Kalamazoo area, both to a lot of businesses, current and perhaps future, and to commuters who use that route to get in and out of downtown Kalamazoo.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_05: I also spoke with Trevor Black, who is MDOT's Transportation Service Center Manager in Davison, about a project that rebuilt about three miles of I-475 from the Flint River to Carpenter Road with an investment of$141 million made possible by Governor Whitmer's Rebuilding Michigan program.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_05: Next week you'll hear about two other projects: the completion of a roundabout at M-72 and M22, formerly a signaled intersection of those heavily traveled roads, especially in the summer, just outside Traverse City, and completion of a new bridge on Fruit Ridge Avenue over I-96 and Walker, just west of Grand Rapids, that includes non-motorized connections for the trails there.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_05: Uh a big thing for cyclists and people who use those trails for sure.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_05: And then some other improvements to help the flow of traffic to the many industries in that area.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_05: So I hope you enjoy the conversations.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_05: First, as mentioned, a focus on the US 131 business route interchange near Kalamazoo before you hear from Jill Bland.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_05: I'll play a little sound from the celebration event and state senator Sean McCann's comments.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_04: This is a win-win-win.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_04: I know it's a little overused, but it's so true here.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_04: It's a win for our ability to broaden our community's economic development opportunities in this area, thanks to this easier access.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_04: It's a win for our transit, our drivability, and our navigation around our community.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_04: It ties right into Kalamazoo's complete street strategy, and it's going to bolster the exciting momentum that's going on in downtown and our nearby neighborhoods.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_05: And as promised, I'm with Jill Bland, who is an executive vice president with Southwest Michigan First.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_05: Uh I always describe it generically as an economic development firm.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_05: But uh Jill, thanks for being here.
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_05: And uh tell us first before we talk about this project, which was celebrated last week with uh a lot of great comments and participation.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_05: Um talk about Southwest Michigan first and what you do there.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_00: Great.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_00: So at Southwest Michigan First, we work with companies that are in the um Southwest Michigan area with a primary focus in Kamazoo and St.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_00: Joe counties.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_00: But we work with um primarily manufacturing, um, logistics facilities, RD, medical device, pharmaceutical um companies throughout the area.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_00: And we really help to retain them in the community when they have an opportunity for growth.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_00: We're gonna help them um find out all the resources and um tools that we can bring to the table to help them grow, add more jobs, increase their investment in the community.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_00: And then we also head up an attraction program to bring new companies into the community.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_00: We also serve as the the Kalamazoo Greater Kalmazou Area Chamber of Commerce.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and so we work with businesses of all types in that space and uh small, medium, large.
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't matter.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_00: We want to be there to help companies grow and prosper.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_05: So talk about the priority that that infrastructure and specifically transportation infrastructure is for these businesses and why that probably is one of your major focuses.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_00: Um as you can imagine, every company that we bring into the community is gonna have vehicles of some type, whether it be for the employees that work at the facility or um the trucks that need to bring product um both from a supply as well as a completed product out the other door.
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_00: So we are always um when we're talking with our companies, we're always talking about um the road infrastructure, in some cases the rail infrastructure, um as well as air service and things like that.
• 4:53
  SPEAKER_00: So, how can we um help them move product in and out of the facility?
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_00: And how can we be most efficient while doing that?
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_05: So when you're talking about attraction specifically, you know, how soon do you get the questions about that?
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_05: I mean, would you say that's in the top five things, the considerations for people?
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_00: Sure, absolutely.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_00: Um, it is something that they um tend to look at right away.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_00: Um, generally, when we are pitching a site, we've already identified the site and have a great deal of detail about what that infrastructure to support the site looks like.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and you know, we look at what are the unique characteristics of the company.
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_00: So, where does it make the most sense for them to locate?
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_00: And then when we pitch the site, we provide them with all of that information.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_00: But it's usually fairly early on in a project, and it's more and more important these days about accessibility to that infrastructure.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, well, so that brings us to the project that was celebrated last Friday, November 7th.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_05: You worked tirelessly uh advocating for this.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_05: A couple of lawmakers in the Kalamazoo area helped to get their colleagues on board and Lansing with some special grants to make this happen.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_05: So nearly$20 million to and I I travel this often because I live in Grand Rapids and I have relatives in Battle Creek, and I would sometimes take the business route and cut through Kalamazoo because I hate going a little bit west to then go east on 131 and 94.
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_05: So talk about why this was so important, this uh this kind of extension and and rebuilding or expansion of the interchange, I guess.
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_00: Well, as as we noted, this project, my first involvement with this project was back in the late 90s.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um we brought together a group of businesses um in the north side of Kalamazoo as well as up in the parchment area, kind of that greater area to talk about what some of their challenges were.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_00: And um 131 interchange came up many times.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_00: While a lot of them do go north to Grand Rapids, they also wanted to go south and they didn't like driving through downtown Kalamazoo with their trucks.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_00: Um, as well as I'm sure the city of Kalamazoo and the residents in between, because they had to drive through neighborhoods, didn't like it either.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_00: And so we began the discussion really to take a deep dive into this whole infrastructure challenge back um 99 was roughly um the first time um our then Congressman Fred Upton helped um by getting some funding for us to do basically a traffic study and kind of a preliminary design of what it could look like and what it might cost.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_00: And um, that's when when things really um started taking off.
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_00: Um during the next five to ten years, we had several companies relocate in the community because of this challenge.
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_00: The good news is they stayed in the community and we were able to find them sites that had you know stronger infrastructure nearby.
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_00: Um but we did um also lose a few small ones along the way.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and we've had some that have um changed names.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_00: And so we always were felt really strongly that the companies needed to be at the table so that we could have the data that they could provide about the trucks and again the the employee vehicles and those kind of things.
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_00: So it was truly 20 years of good conversation between multiple units of government, multiple governmental agencies, both at the local as well as at the state and federal level, and then um the private sector engaging with the and what you probably learned along the way um with your patience and perseverance is that um in a state that's been strapped to properly fund transportation infrastructure for decades, everybody says, I know, I know there's no money, but you have to do this one thing, right?
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_05: And that's that's kind of where you were at.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_05: And you had to say, look to your folks, you know, you had to say, look, we're working on this, we're gonna make it happen, and it's just gonna take a while, right?
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yes, that's exactly um true.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and and believe me, every time we had a new project or new opportunity come to the table, we researched all of the various funding uh organizations, tools that that we might be able to utilize um to help offset the cost of this.
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_00: So um there were many opportunities along the way, and we looked and and dug and and uh finally uh during the pandemic.
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, here's here's a good example where the pandemic paid off.
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_00: As we were doing virtual meetings, we were getting great participation.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_00: We would leave those meetings, everybody would have an assignment of something that they needed to go look at in terms of an infrastructure tool.
• 9:43
  SPEAKER_00: And lo and behold, um, a couple years later coming out of it, you know, we were able to uh through our state legislators able to secure funding to make this happen.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_00: But it wasn't through what I would say would be traditional uh means for gaining funding for infrastructure.
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, and I I think it was just tremendously satisfying last Friday to have so many people come together and and celebrate it and not lament, you know, what it took to get here, but just say let's look forward and and and focus on what we have.
• 10:14
  SPEAKER_05: And um I appreciate especially the way you worked with Carrie Denbraber, the TSC manager there for MDOT and her perseverance too, and overseeing this.
• 10:23
  SPEAKER_05: There were definitely some ups and downs along the way, but I I think it's it's just great.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_05: It's too bad Representative Upton couldn't be there because he has always been a real champion or was a champion when he was in Congress for infrastructure.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_05: But uh it's nice that it's nice that you gave him a shout out anyway.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, no, I mean again, this project took so many people and the team at MDOT, they were there the entire way through.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_00: I thought it was really cool.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_00: We had two of the uh uh planners that were in place along the way for MDOT um at the ribbon cutting.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, again, so many hands made this happen.
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_00: So um you're absolutely right.
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_00: Shout out to everybody that that was there and and um that participated along the way.
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_05: So what's uh looking forward, uh what do you see as uh as challenges or potential bright spots for the economy in Kalamazoo and St.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_05: Joe counties?
• 11:16
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, I mean things are are looking pretty good.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_00: We're really excited what this will mean to the north side, and then you know, to the north up into parchment, we do have some um industrial properties that um we're able to market.
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_00: And so this really opens that door for new opportunities, new job potential, expansion of existing companies that continue to make investment in the community, um, but also throughout the rest of the region.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_00: We've spent the last couple of years really identifying key sites, again, that were close to the infrastructure that we need to bring in industrial businesses.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, we've got some great sites throughout the region that we can market.
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_00: And so we're we're very optimistic and really excited about uh what the future holds.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_05: Well, it'll be fun to watch um along the way and see what this particular project uh was able to kind of kick start in terms of that development.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_05: So we'll be we'll be keeping an eye on that.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_05: Thank you, Jill, very much for taking time to come on and talk about this and uh you know good luck going forward.
• 12:25
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_00: I appreciate it.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_00: Uh let us know how else we can be a good partner with you all in the future.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_05: Absolutely.
• 12:32
  SPEAKER_05: Please stay tuned.
• 12:33
  SPEAKER_05: We'll be back with more talking Michigan transportation right after this.
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_01: Even with the best planning, backups and traffic congestion can occur during road construction.
• 12:47
  SPEAKER_01: This can pose hazardous situations for both motorists and construction workers, particularly when drivers are distracted.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_01: Motorists are more likely than workers to be killed or injured in work zone-related incidents.
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_01: Additionally, the leading causes of all work zone-related crashes are distracted driving and speeding.
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_01: So it's crucial to do your part in ensuring the safety of both drivers and focusing on your most important task, safe driving.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_01: Slow down and stay focused.
• 13:19
  SPEAKER_05: So I'm back with Trevor Block, who is the Transportation Service Center manager in Davison, which means he takes in Genesee County.
• 13:28
  SPEAKER_05: Um, what else is part of your TSC, Trevor?
• 13:32
  SPEAKER_02: Um, we've got La Pier County and Shiawassee County as well.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_05: Okay.
• 13:36
  SPEAKER_05: So um a lot of uh a lot of the population in the Greater Flint area, and he was heavily involved in the rebuild of this three-mile segment of I-475, which is actually part of a larger corridor improvement.
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_05: Um, but they celebrated last week, as I mentioned, November 7th, uh great um outpouring of support from the community and from labor leaders and uh had the lieutenant governor there among others.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_03: I was really proud to stand uh just a few miles from here last spring for the groundbreaking of this I-475 rebuild to be here uh just a little over a year and a half later.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_03: It speaks to Michigan's commitment to making sure that our roads are safe, to making sure that they are the highest quality in the region.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_05: So, Trevor, talk a little bit about the project and the challenges along the way and and you know why you were so happy to be able to celebrate it.
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, absolutely, Jeff.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_02: Um, you know, so this was uh uh a reconstruction project uh funded through uh rebuilding Michigan funds.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_02: Um, you know, we we didn't know we were going to get this project and until that money came along.
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_02: Uh we always had uh big dreams for Flint and knowing that we had a lot of work to do on that I-475 corridor, so you know, getting those uh that bond funding to be able to do the work here, um, one of one of the best parts is that uh the condition was bad enough that really anything we were doing, we know we were making a good improvement to it.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_02: So it's kind of like a blank slate going into it.
• 15:08
  SPEAKER_02: We knew we were gonna help out the community a lot, and um kind of the changes that Flint has gone through over the last uh few decades.
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_02: There's a lot of drop-off in um in population and in um vehicle miles traveled through the area.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_02: So we have a lot of additional infrastructure out there that we didn't need.
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_02: So we had opportunities to to look at right-sizing the area, try to bring the roadway down to something more manageable.
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_02: And I think that uh goes a long way when you just look at kind of aesthetically, too.
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_02: You you have a road that fits.
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_02: It just feels more um familiar when you're when you're going through the area.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_02: Um we had opportunities to have bridges that were very expensive and hard to maintain, um, that really weren't servicing um many people, and then had alternate uh routes available.
• 16:01
  SPEAKER_02: We were able to get rid of some of that, make make improvements to the operations um that was just cost effective and it made a lot of sense.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_02: And I think at in the end, the project came out just being a real facelift for the the northern Flint area.
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_05: So when you talk about that right sizing and things that um that all states are facing really in a challenged funding environment, some states, growth states, are doing better than others, but that's something that we'll continue to have to look at.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_05: And like you said, it isn't just about the money, it's really about something that better serves the community.
• 16:34
  SPEAKER_05: So talk more specifically about that and and why you think this is aesthetically better.
• 16:39
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, well, and it's actually a very um intimidating process to go into, right?
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_02: Because you're almost like acknowledging, you're verbalizing that there is a reduction in population and that sort of thing, right?
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_02: And that can be like a tough uh the message that comes across.
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_02: But I think once you get to the finished product, then it makes a lot more sense.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_02: So, you know, to have to go out and say, hey, we're reducing the number of lanes because there's not as many people here, um, that there's a lot of discussion around like, oh, what about future growth, stuff like that?
• 17:13
  SPEAKER_02: And it's like, yeah, but if we don't see it yet, why spend all that additional money for that improvement, right?
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_02: So um, you know, we we look at what's most practical and and we build for it.
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_02: And and you know, going through that, that this northern section of Flint, you can just the the two lanes now that we have, um, there was three lanes that extended through a good segment of it and and going down to to two lanes, um, you just you you're on the road and you just you just feel like this makes sense.
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_02: I mean it's it tightens everything up.
• 17:44
  SPEAKER_02: We were able to uh um improve the shoulder widths out there.
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_02: It's uh an area where the the curbs have always run immediately adjacent to the roadway, which is always a problem for um, you know, number one, for safety, for being uh, you know, something you get hit and and and lose control of the vehicle.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_02: But then it's also an issue for future maintenance down the road.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_02: You have limited options when you're immediately tied to the curb and gutter and next to the lanes.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_02: Um, your options for like overlaying the roadway and that sort of thing become limited.
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_02: So um, you know, getting to make those improvements and just having a road that's now more standard, um, it just feels so much more comfortable going through there and it just makes sense.
• 18:26
  SPEAKER_02: It doesn't look um kind of desolate or um it doesn't look like there's been decline.
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_02: It looks like it just fits.
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_02: And I think that's a great starting point now for kind of moving into the future and and just bringing, we get that good facelift of the road, and it I think it's just gonna promote a more positive atmosphere for the area.
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_05: Well, looking at the future, I mean, that ties into the safety components that you're talking about and the reasons why in a certain era we had to have lanes built the width they were, and we had to have shoulders such as they were.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_05: Um, there are a lot of smart people that think, you know, as we get into automated vehicles, and we're a long ways from autonomous vehicles, but we're adding automated features all the time to make our vehicles safer.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_05: Um, you know, if you're a fan of the movie Minority Report and you saw what they envisioned for the future and how vehicles travel very close together safely, you don't need as much capacity.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_05: That that's part of the idea.
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_05: And I think we're gonna get there.
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_05: I don't know how many years away, and nobody knows exactly what the future holds, or whether we're gonna be doing more multimodal travel and there won't be as many of us in our personal vehicles.
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_05: But there's lots of reasons to believe that even with uh a resurgence population growth, we don't need as much capacity as we did when we were building these things in the 50s and 60s.
• 19:45
  SPEAKER_02: Uh yeah, absolutely.
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_02: I agree with that.
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_02: It kind of takes uh some of the risk away, right?
• 19:50
  SPEAKER_02: That you don't have to worry as much about that future growth because, like you said, I think the no matter what, you know, 20, 30 years from now, I think our options are going to be related to either a more efficient roadway or um or a different uh means of travel, right?
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, I mean there was a time when you know automatic braking systems uh you know were only on the most expensive luxury vehicles.
• 20:16
  SPEAKER_05: Now they've they're on vehicles at all price ranges, you know, same with you know rear assists, same with just anti-lock brakes.
• 20:23
  SPEAKER_05: You know, that didn't used to be on every vehicle, and that's a huge safety feature.
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_05: You know, I don't even know if you're old enough to have been taught to pump the brakes when you were on a slippery surface, but old enough to hear a lot of stories about it.
• 20:34
  SPEAKER_02: But no, I think my first car had them.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, so that's that's great.
• 20:39
  SPEAKER_05: Um, talk about some of the challenges along the way.
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_05: I don't know, you've been involved as a construction engineer on other projects.
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_05: This one was$141 million.
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_05: That's that's pretty big as these projects go.
• 20:48
  SPEAKER_05: There were some ups and downs, I'm sure.
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, absolutely.
• 20:52
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and you know, it fortunately, uh, if that's the right word, um, the$140 million wasn't too bad in our recent uh recent rebuilding Michigan um timeframe, right?
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, there's so been so many big projects that a lot of us uh around MDOT have had to manage these huge budgets.
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, with that, like it's like every part of work becomes so it feels so heavy, every uh decision you make on the project.
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_02: But um, like anything we do, you know, you make a few of those decisions the first time and they become easier.
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_02: So um, you know, budget-wise, uh it it wasn't so bad.
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_02: But um, you know, this project from its beginning uh has been not difficult, but just interesting to work through, right?
• 21:39
  SPEAKER_02: We uh we got the rebuilding Michigan money and then we started looking at what we were gonna do on I-475.
• 21:47
  SPEAKER_02: And um, in conjunction with FHWA, it immediately got uh moved over to a planning and and environmental linkages um process.
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_02: So we went through a good uh year and a half of working with the communities um to make sure that whatever we were going to propose was something that was in line with um their needs.
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_02: So it was an extensive effort, very similar to what people are familiar with that occurred down on I-375.
• 22:20
  SPEAKER_02: We had regular meetings with neighborhood groups, we had steering committees, advisory committees, um, you know, just reaching out to people on the ground, you know, going to community centers and talking to leaders of communities.
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_02: And they really gave us a whole lot of insight in that development process that we wouldn't have known just from looking at average daily traffic and um and condition of the roadway, that sort of thing, you know, kind of our assumptions on the road.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_02: We had to really get a feel for what the city needed out of this roadway.
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_02: And so Oh, I'm sorry.
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_05: I was just gonna say that planning and environmental linkages, we call those Pell studies, and they involve a lot of public involvement, as you said.
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_05: Um, so have you been involved in a Pell study of uh with this kind of scope previously?
• 23:10
  SPEAKER_02: No, I hadn't before.
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_02: And I I was in the uh design project manager position when this project started.
• 23:19
  SPEAKER_02: So um it was very fresh, but I think it was we were all kind of up for new things when Rebuilding Michigan started, right?
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_02: We it's it's like everybody's gonna get into something they haven't done before, and we're gonna make the best of it that we can.
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_02: So um this came along and we had a lot of help from uh Ruth Hepfer and and Margaret Barendis when they were um, you know, working more closely with us here at MDOT and FHWA and and and they led us on the right path there to get started.
• 23:46
  SPEAKER_02: And, you know, it's not the the part of it, it wasn't that difficult, right?
• 23:51
  SPEAKER_02: It was a lot of the things we already did, but now we're doing them more intensively.
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_02: And then there was the community outreach portion that was much bigger than we're used to.
• 24:00
  SPEAKER_02: But when really the scope of that is just talking to the people that the roadway matters to, um, it's not very difficult to get up and do it every day, you know?
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_02: It's uh they have so much information to provide to you.
• 24:14
  SPEAKER_05: So you went to college to be a civil engineer and you focused on engineering and solving problems with engineering solutions.
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_05: I'll bet you didn't have a lot of classes that talked about how to do that kind of community involvement.
• 24:26
  SPEAKER_02: No, not at all.
• 24:27
  SPEAKER_02: We did not have a uh working with the public 101 class uh in engineering school.
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_02: But I mean, for most people that know me though, I am pretty chatty as it is.
• 24:37
  SPEAKER_02: So I didn't I didn't mind it too much.
• 24:39
  SPEAKER_02: Um but but it it's uh it's certainly a skill.
• 24:43
  SPEAKER_02: And um, you know, when when you know though that the end goal is that you're gonna provide something for them that's better than what they already have and that's more in line with what they're envisioning, um it's pretty easy to have confidence in what you're doing.
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_05: So it had to feel pretty good to celebrate this with all of those uh political and uh local leaders.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_05: Um you know, talk about that celebration and you know how it felt to just sit back and hear what people had to say.
• 25:14
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, absolutely.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_02: I um I I I've always really enjoyed working in Flint because there's just um so much opportunity.
• 25:23
  SPEAKER_02: There's um we can do so many things, and I and I laugh at what we do as a profession because like I I sometimes I say like we just build roads, we just build bridges, like really we just do things with rocks.
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, how impactful can we actually be?
• 25:39
  SPEAKER_02: But but everyone uses what we do on a daily basis, too, right?
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_02: So as simple as rocks are, uh it makes a huge difference.
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_02: And in going through in the projects that we still have planned for the area, um, you know, continuing south on 475 to finish up the corridor, reconstructing it here in the next several years, as well as uh a reconstruction project on M21 in downtown Flint.
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_02: Um, you know, we're doing our part, really.
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_02: Everything that we have in the area, we're coming in and we're reconstructing it, giving it that facelift that that they need.
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_02: And it's gonna be so positive.
• 26:17
  SPEAKER_02: We get a lot of calls that are, you know, why does Flint have the worst roads?
• 26:21
  SPEAKER_02: Why does everybody else get their roads taken care of except instead of us?
• 26:25
  SPEAKER_02: Um, we get those calls regularly.
• 26:27
  SPEAKER_05: And to be clear, those calls come into the various MDOT offices all over the state.
• 26:33
  SPEAKER_05: Everybody's convinced that some someplace else is getting all the money.
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_05: So yeah.
• 26:37
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, absolutely, right.
• 26:39
  SPEAKER_02: Everyone um, you know, what they see most often is is what's going to be on their mind.
• 26:45
  SPEAKER_02: But you know, this is um phase, I'd you know, I'd call it, you know, phase two.
• 26:49
  SPEAKER_02: We had a project to the north of the one that just recently got completed.
• 26:52
  SPEAKER_02: So this is kind of the second one we've completed um in the last five years.
• 26:57
  SPEAKER_02: And it it's it's great to see it now.
• 27:00
  SPEAKER_02: You get off of I-75 on the north end and you start heading down 475.
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_02: It's a different road than it used to be, and it sets a different tone for the city.
• 27:11
  SPEAKER_02: And um, you know, having the the lieutenant governor out there last Friday uh to do the ribbon cutting, looking at the you know, the tradespeople and uh the contractor out there as well, and the construction team that was out there, everybody's excited to see this because it's not just kind of a freshened up um replace and kind type project where it just looks exactly like it did before.
• 27:34
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, it it really looks nice down there, and and it just it just feels like a true modernization for the area.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_02: And and the more the more that I can do of that in Flint, um the better it's gonna feel.
• 27:47
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, that's really really nicely said.
• 27:49
  SPEAKER_05: I think uh planning and environmental linkages sounds like one of those bureaucratic terms, but in in the end, what it really means, the linkages means connections.
• 27:56
  SPEAKER_05: It means that you're building connections within the community um and obviously supporting economic development, which is very high on and that's mission.
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_05: So, what's what's next for the 475 corridor improvements?
• 28:09
  SPEAKER_02: Well, up next, right now, we are just finishing off uh design of the next of the last segment.
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_02: Um it's about a five-mile stretch that hits the remainder from Bristol Road up to the Flint River, and that's gonna start off.
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_02: We're hoping here late spring of 2026 that we'll break ground on that project.
• 28:31
  SPEAKER_02: And that one's gonna take um probably two and a half to three years to get finished because it's it's a long one.
• 28:38
  SPEAKER_02: There's a lot of changes that are gonna be happening, but it's gonna be more of the same.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, there's three lanes that go through there right now.
• 28:45
  SPEAKER_02: We're gonna bring it down to two lanes and kind of narrow our overall footprint that we have through the right-of-way, because you know, one of the biggest things we had through there was the connecting communities um type of initiative where um, you know, historic redlining and and uh just the introduction of the freeway really is just split off and segmented the different communities in the area.
• 29:10
  SPEAKER_02: And you can go downtown and you look across the freeway, and there's a you know, vibrant neighborhood across the way, but they have to cross a three-lane one way, and then they've gotta, you know, take a go across a bridge over the freeway, and then another three-lane one way.
• 29:28
  SPEAKER_02: It's it's 300 feet from downtown um to the neighborhood, and you look across, and it's it it seems like a mile.
• 29:37
  SPEAKER_02: You know what I mean?
• 29:37
  SPEAKER_02: It's one of those that it just it it really kind of um hinders you mentally from from making that with that walk across.
• 29:45
  SPEAKER_02: And so we're gonna narrow down those uh service drive one ways on either side.
• 29:49
  SPEAKER_02: We're gonna add a um one of the five bridges that are that go through there.
• 29:55
  SPEAKER_02: We're going to take traffic off of it and we're gonna make it a pedestrian facility.
• 30:01
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah, have some, you know, some benches and that sort of thing on top of it and make it more of a a place making area just to try to encourage that that connection um between the east side neighborhoods and downtown.
• 30:14
  SPEAKER_02: And um and then along with that we have some infrastructure there that's uh like I said, it's it's not utilized and redundant.
• 30:21
  SPEAKER_02: There's a ramp that is redundant and it's got a lot of crashes, and we're gonna get rid of that one and um have everybody get off on the one that's safer and capacities there for um you know all these changes that we're making.
• 30:35
  SPEAKER_02: Um and overall, yeah, I hope that we just kind of make it a a a tighter, less impactful footprint um within our right-of-way and try to make it more of a community-centered area.
• 30:48
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, I know it's a really, really cool multi-phase sort of project to be part of.
• 30:52
  SPEAKER_05: So, you know, good, good for you.
• 30:54
  SPEAKER_05: Sounds like you're you're enjoying it.
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, absolutely.
• 30:56
  SPEAKER_05: Well, thanks, Trevor.
• 30:57
  SPEAKER_05: Thanks for talking about this.
• 30:58
  SPEAKER_05: Congratulations on bringing this one to a close and good luck with the next phase.
• 31:02
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, thank you, Jeff.
• 31:03
  SPEAKER_05: It's been a pleasure.
• 31:03
  SPEAKER_05: Thank you again for tuning in to the Talking Michigan Transportation Podcast.
• 31:07
  SPEAKER_05: I want to thank my guests, Jill Bland of Southwest Michigan First and Trevor Black of MDOT's Davison Transportation Service Center.
• 31:16
  SPEAKER_05: Again, next week I'll be back with a couple other installments picking up on where we are with these project celebrations.
• 31:23
  SPEAKER_05: It's the construction season draws to a close here in Michigan.
• 31:26
  SPEAKER_05: I'll be talking about the I-96 Fruit Ridge Bridge replacement in Walker, just west of Grand Rapids.
• 31:33
  SPEAKER_05: I'll also be talking about a new roundabout that we celebrated at M72 and M22, just outside of Traverse City.
• 31:42
  SPEAKER_05: You can find show notes and more on Apple Podcasts or BuzzSprout.
• 31:46
  SPEAKER_05: I also want to acknowledge the talented people who helped make this a reality each week, starting with Randy Devler, who skillfully edits the audio, Jesse Ball, who proofs the content, Courtney Bates, who posts the podcast to various platforms, and Jackie Salinas, who transcribes the audio to make it accessible to all.