SYRACUSE, N.Y. - Only nine people turned out Monday afternoon to tell the Syracuse Common Council their preferences for the future of Interstate 81 -- hardly enough to get a sense of public opinion.
But Council President Van Robinson said the council will continue to search out and evaluate information so that it can weigh in before state transportation officials decide the elevated highway's future.
Robinson said his next step will be to appoint an ad hoc committee -- composed of council members, experts and stakeholders -- who will report back to the council and help shape its response.
Monday's 4 p.m. public hearing was finished so quickly that developer Bob Doucette, who arrived about 4:40 p.m., was too late to speak. (For the record, Doucette favors tearing down the viaduct to create a street-level boulevard.)
Four speakers, including Todd Buchko, general manager of the WonderWorks entertainment facility at Destiny USA, stressed the convenience of the current I-81 structure and recommended keeping it an elevated highway.Landscape architect Stephen Buechner offered his vision of a highway tunnel covered by a 32-acre park at street level, a development he said would energize downtown as neither a boulevard nor an elevated highway would.
Howie Hawkins, a Green Party candidate running for the 4th District council seat, said he would like mass transportation to be considered. Hawkins suggested that through traffic could be sent around Syracuse on I-481 while much of the traffic into the city could be provided by buses, light rail, or other public transportation.
David Mankiewicz, senior vice president of the business development group CenterState CEO, urged the council not to back a specific plan until the state completes an environmental review. The review will reveal important information about the impacts of competing plans, he said.
Two other speakers also did not recommend a specific plan, but urged the council to remain focused on the project because of its importance.
The state Department of Transportation started an "I-81 Challenge'' in 2009 to gather public input on the future of the highway through downtown, said James D'Agostino, director of the Syracuse Metropolitan Transportation Council, which is cooperating in the effort.
State DOT officials began with five master strategies and recently declared three of the plans "unfeasible,'' D'Agostino said. The remaining options are to create a boulevard or to reconstruct an elevated highway.
The state's I-81 corridor study "is coming to an end shortly" and will give way soon to detailed environmental reviews required by the state and federal governments. The public will have more opportunities for comment during the environmental reviews, after which final decisions will be made, D'Agostino said.
Contact Tim Knauss at tknauss@syracuse.com or 315-470-3023.
