Published: May 08, 2008 10:09 pm         

Veto won’t affect road construction — for now

Federally funded projects will proceed as planned

Despite Gov. Steve Beshear’s veto of the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet’s budget, none of Laurel County’s road projects have been eliminated from the Six Year Highway Plan.

However, as to whether all of those projects will come to fruition is unknown.

Chuck Wolfe, spokesman for the KTC, explained the highway plan includes more projects than there is money to pay for them.

“(Transportation) Secretary (Joe) Prather calls it a ‘wish list,’” Wolfe said. “There was a time that it was a balanced plan. But sometime during the (Paul) Patton administration that changed. It got top heavy with projects — the combined total of which surpassed actual revenues.”

The reason for Beshear’s veto is the General Assembly had passed legislation that would cement the highway plan into record “without the ability to make adjustments that are always needed,” Wolfe said.

If the highway plan was on record as a statute but there wasn’t enough funds to pay for all the projects, the state could be responsible for them.

“That’s a serious question as to what would have happened,” Wolfe said.

There are six road projects listed in the highway plan for Laurel County, three of which will be federally funded.

All federally funded projects will proceed as planned.

Those three projects include the construction of a frontage road that will parallel Interstate 75 between exits 38 and 41; the plan to built a roundabout at the junction of KY 363 and KY 1006; and replacement of the bridge over the Rockcastle River at the Laurel County and Rockcastle County line.

Construction for the frontage road is scheduled for 2008. The other two projects are expected to be undertaken in 2010.

The three state-funded projects include building a road at the back entrance of South Laurel High School that would connect to KY 192 and KY 363; widening U.S. 25 to five lanes from KY 1006 to KY 2069 and building a connector road from U.S. 25 to KY 229; and increasing the capacity on Robinson Creek Bridge on U.S. 25.

Wolfe said the revised highway plan should be released in June.