Expand Transit not Highways

People Over Pavement
Written By Matt Butler

Expanding the Brent Spence Corridor is a
bad deal for Greater Cincinnati

16+ lanes wide • $3.6+ billion wasted • 8+ years of construction • 29+ bulldozed homes & businesses •  90+ acres of forest destroyed • Worse traffic

There’s still time for change. Sign the petition below to show your support and stay informed.

Highway expansion projects harm already vulnerable populations, including communities of color and low-income communities. This expansion project will promulgate plumes of dust and fumes, worsening air pollution and health outcomes in nearby communities long-term while interrupting people’s everyday lives in the short term.

To make the existing bridge traffic flow better, congestion pricing should be implemented for non-local traffic. Congestion pricing, if drafted appropriately, can be equitable, cost-effective, and reduce carbon-emissions. A highway expansion project of this caliber will only attract more truck traffic and heighten congestion issues.

Rather than spend billions on an un-aesthetic, unnecessary highway and its maintenance, we should be investing in reconnecting communities and improving the livelihoods of our residents. Funding should be shifted to expanding transit options and multi-modal transportation projects. We should be reducing air pollution, water runoff, and greenhouse gas emissions, not creating opportunities to worsen them. 

The form below will send your comments directly to city council – below the submission form we also have more information summarizing the deficiencies in ODOT’s process. (in short: 1. Inadequate Consideration of Environmental and Health Impacts 2. Failure to Consider or Mitigate Impacts on Minority Communities 3. Exclusion of Reasonable Alternatives Such as Transit 4. Neglect of Induced Travel Demand and Potential Mitigation Strategies 5. ODOT is operating on an environmental study that is 12 years old for a $3.6 billion project!).

Please submit the form above with your own comments to city council. Make sure to let them know your concerns about ODOT’s project, your priorities and how you would prefer the $3.6 billion to be spent.

Below is a summary analysis of ODOT’s environmental analysis and project to date.

  • Failure to conduct an updated Environmental Impact Statement, relying instead on an outdated assessment from 2012

  • Ignoring the reality of induced traffic demand, where expanding highways attracts more traffic and negates any congestion relief

  • Disregarding the disproportionate negative impacts on low-income and minority neighborhoods adjacent to the highway

  • Neglecting to study alternatives like congestion pricing on the existing bridge and expanding public transit options

  • Contributing to air pollution, noise, and greenhouse gas emissions that harm public health and the environment

  • Missing an opportunity to repair past harms and reconnect communities divided by the original highway construction

  • Facilitating sprawl and automobile-dependence rather than sustainable, transit-oriented development


Updates:

Matt Butler
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