Spending on infrastructure is a bit like shopping for school clothes.
You can plan for the future and prepare for inevitable growth. Or you can pretend that growth is avoidable while insisting that last year’s now-2-sizes-too-small pants still fit. Whether ignoring the need for infrastructure or the need for new school clothes, the result is the same — you look silly.
That is the analogy that comes to mind as officials in north Clark County look to the future and open a revamped state Highway 502. The 7-mile corridor, which runs from Interstate 5 to the burgeoning city, has undergone a much-needed $84.4 million renovation that was marked this week by a ribbon-cutting ceremony. The project widened the highway from two lanes to four and added shoulders on both sides. It also added a median to separate eastbound traffic from vehicles heading west.
The immediate impact will be to improve safety on one of the most harrowing roads in the county. Increased population in the area has led to increased traffic, and the narrow highway has been ill-suited for accommodating that traffic.
But the long-term benefits will be equally important. “This will give us another tool in trying to convince the business folks to look into the north county, where we have shovel-ready land, a workforce able to do the work, and a more business-friendly climate than our friends in the southern part of the county,” Battle Ground mayor Philip Johnson said last year, when he was deputy mayor. Or, as then-mayor Shane Bowman added, “We have to look at economic priorities. … We hope having easier access can attract businesses that need that access — that they come because of that.”
In other words, you need to spend money to make money — and that is a lesson that is relevant to this country’s negligent approach to infrastructure. America’s aversion to constructing or updating bridges and roads is hampering the economy while ignoring the reality of the future. As U.S. News reported in March: “The American Society of Civil Engineers most recently gave America a D+ rating in terms of infrastructure, citing dilapidated roadways, insufficient waterways and ‘a pressing need for modernization.’ The group estimates $3.6 trillion would need to be invested into U.S. infrastructure by 2020 just to raise the country’s support systems to acceptable levels.”
In Battle Ground, the city’s population has more than doubled over the past 16 years to a total of nearly 20,000 — partly through annexation and partly through increased density in north county. Such growth requires a growing infrastructure, yet legislative representatives — Sen. Don Benton and Reps. Liz Pike and Brandon Vick — all voted against a 2015 transportation package designed to raise $16.1 billion through a gas-tax increase. The bill passed anyway, and precious little funding was earmarked for projects in north Clark County.
Funding for the revamped Highway 502 came from gas taxes approved by the Legislature in 2003 and 2005. But what about the next big project in the Battle Ground area? What about the future needs of north county? The area will continue to grow, and leaders in the county and in Olympia should prepare for that growth.
Such preparation is time-consuming. Discussion about the Highway 502 project began in 1999, development started 12 years ago, and construction got underway in 2012. Other areas of the county should take note; their pants are getting a little tight.
