(WHAS11) - Today, the debate over the bridges was renewed before the Bi-State Authority whose charged with finding a way to build the bridges and deciding who should pay and how.
It was clear that in tough economic times there are no easy solutions, and maybe no solutions. In a room full of people, there was a wide range of opinion, everything from tolls on existing bridges to pay for future bridges, to suggestions to abandoned road projects and gasoline powered vehicles.
And in a time when federal money may be hard to obtain, the plan to charge you to cross the river is striking a nerve.
“If you begin to pay tolls on bridges that you already own, you are in fact, increasing a major tax on this community,” Tyler Allen, Democratic mayoral candidate, said.
With traffic backing up every day on interstate 65, most still see the need for a bridge or bridges, but nobody wants to pay for it.
But around the back of the room people were holding protest signs, not reaching for their wallets. At the least, a lot of input suggested downsizing the projects.
“But we need to do this responsibly. And we need to do this in a way that respects the taxpayers of this community,” Allen said.
The chairman of the bridges coalition says starting the project now, in a low interest environment would save money.
“If we get in there and get this rolling. We’re thinking there's upwards of a billion dollars in savings from the existing projections of the project. We think that you gotta move quickly, responsibly, but move quickly,” David Micklies, chairmen of the Bridges Coalition, said.
But some people still don’t' want to move at all.
Even representatives of the federal government admit this will be a hard sell.
“There just simply isn't enough money available to get the job done,” Regina McElroy, a member of the Federal Highway Administration said.
