Tuesday's Internet Edition, July 08, 2008.
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This was one of forty-four public meetings where the public was invited to study the maps and learn more about the project, ask questions and provide input.
Many residents of Lee, Milam and surrounding counties attended the meeting. Lee County Judge Evan Gonzales and Precinct 1 Commissioner Maurice Pitts were in attendance.
Judge Gonzales said, “We are very concerned about the proposed routes of this project in that we feel that they come way too far east, thus passing through Lee County. I feel like this has the ability to ruin many rural towns.”
The meeting was in a trade show format in that maps were set up in two rooms and Trans-Texas Corridor representatives were stationed at each map to answer questions and take input. Everyone attending was encouraged to rotate around the rooms, talk with different people and voice their opinions either verbally or in written form. Written comments could be deposited in a box at the meeting or taken home to complete and later mailed to the Director of the Turnpike Corridor Systems for the State of Texas.
The TTC-35 is a two-tier effort that will focus on identification and evaluation of specific route alternatives. The project is in the middle of the first tier effort.
Dieter Billek, the Advanced Project Development Director for the Texas Turnpike Authority Division, said, “By Spring, we will have three to four ten-mile-wide corridors identified and by late summer, we will have this narrowed down to one ten-mile-wide corridor running from Mexico to Oklahoma.
“There will be public input each step of the way and during each tier, potential impacts will be assessed, including the impact of the corridor to natural resources, such as habitat, wetlands, air quality, land use, socio-economic, noise, neighborhoods and existing development and cultural resources,” Billek continued.