Dozens take action to tell OKI leaders: Hit the brakes on the Brent Spence and highway expansion

Residents and advocates from Cincinnati, Northern Kentucky and beyond spoke out against auto-centric highway expansion at a public input session hosted by OKI, April 1, 2025.

The Ohio-Kentucky-Indiana Regional Council of Governments is taking public comment until April 10 on its four-year transportation and infrastructure funding plan

The Ohio-Kentucky-Indiana Regional Council of Governments (OKI) is currently seeking public input on its biennial Transportation Improvement Program (TIP), and dozens — including one overseas speaker tuned in virtually — took the chance this week to demand better priorities for our region's transportation future.

Many of the speakers — predominantly residents of neighborhoods soon to be impacted by the looming Brent Spence highway expansion — thanked OKI leaders for recent investments they’ve made in car-alternatives before insisting that they withhold the $1.6 billion earmarked in the TIP for the project until more equitable alternatives are more thoroughly studied.

Vita from West End recalled overhearing her mother and grandmother reminisce about riding trains all around town before the highway invaded. Now she’s worried about even more cars bombarding her neighborhood.

“I’ve had asthma all my life… Something’s got to be done,” she said.

Catherine, a transplant from Indiana, teaches kids about bikes at MoBo Bicycle Co-op in Northside, kids who, she said, also suffer from asthma and ADHD — known risks of growing up near interstate highways — but are excited for the Mill Creek Greenway shared-use path (an OKI-supported project) all the same.

“I want them to be able to continue to grow with our multimodal infrastructure rather than aging out of it, stigmatizing it.”

Andréa, a Cincinnati native who now lives in England, joined the call at 10 p.m. local time. Impressed by how she’s seen transit operate in the U.K., she urged leaders to consider how transit rather than highways can make a region competitive on a global scale.

“Cincinnati wasn’t selected as a host of the World Cup due to its lack of public transportation,” she said. “I know so many people here in England who would have traveled to see it in Cincinnati because they knew me, but Cincinnati wasn't selected, so how much money has been lost?”

One after another, folks encouraged OKI to put people first.

Inspired by their stories, one Warren County resident, who had come to speak about the dangers posed by the rural highways in his neighborhood, decided to speak on the Brent Spence instead. Having moved to Cincinnati in the late ‘80s, he said, “It's been going on now for decades, and I gotta tell you, from what I've seen, the planning now is no better than it was when we first moved here.”

If you’re feeling inspired by these stories, it’s not too late to make your voice heard. OKI is accepting written through April 10.

Here’s a handy guide to some talking points and tips on how to tell leaders your story.

The TIP determines how billions of federal transportation dollars will be spent in our region over the next four years. Currently, the majority of funding is allocated to highway expansion while public transit receives just 11-12% and bicycle/pedestrian infrastructure gets less than 1%.

Watch a five-minute summary of the TIP, provided by OKI staff, here or in the viewer below:

For the Brent Spence alone, this TIP round includes roughly $1.6 billion in federal funding to match a combined contribution of $2 million from the Ohio Department of Transportation and the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet. ODOT and KYTC have presented one option to the public for the interstate overhaul and seem insistent there is no need to consider any further, alternative designs.