2008.10.12
Discuss Trejbal's column on the Smart Road
Learning to love the Smart Road
Trejbal is an editorial writer for The Roanoke Times based in the New River Valley bureau in Christiansburg.Virginians have a curious tendency to hold grudges. Events that took place more than 100 years ago still taint perceptions and generate hostility toward perceived offenders.
Recent history, too, poisons the community when a few people cling to the bitterness of a losing cause. Consider the Virginia Tech Smart Road.
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The use of the Smart Road seems like a win-win situation to me. The testing that is done there is certainly giving researchers and companies information on how to make VA roads safer and vehicles safer throughout the world.
If the money comes along someday, then we might see the completion of the route to 81; but bitterness needs to cease. We are serving a wonderful service to all motorists with the testing being done.
Comment by Katherine Emory — October 12, 2008 @ 8:00 am
I don't know much about the politics of the origination of the Smart Road, but I do know it's a great tool for transportation research. A few months ago, I participated in a study of ways to make tractor trailers safer on the highways. I spent about 2 hours driving a tractor trailer up and down the Smart Road. The truck was equipped with video cameras on the fenders and the rear of the trailer. There were also monitors in the cab. There was a target car following me and on each pass would take a position as if it was passing the truck. I would have to decide the target car was overlapping the trailer or if I was clear of the car. Each pass had different circumstances. Car on the left or right, video cameras turned on or off, streetlights on or off (the test was at night), rain or dry road or fog. A test engineer rode in the truck with me and was in radio contact with the driver of the target car setting up the parameters for the next pass. We did several similar static tests with objects being set up alongside the truck in a dark lot to find out how much better the driver could see these via the cameras compared to just using the truck mirrors.
This was my first experience with VTTI and I found it interesting and useful. The personnel involved with the program were knowledgable and dedicated. I've been involved in the transportation business for most of my life and find this program a very good tool for improving transportation technology now and in the future.
Comment by Nick — October 12, 2008 @ 9:05 am
"Virginians have a curious tendency to hold grudges. Events that took place more than 100 years ago still taint perceptions and generate hostility toward perceived offenders."
I know what you mean. Oh, wait. I thought this was going to be about slavery.
Comment by Josh — October 12, 2008 @ 9:48 am
I love the Smart Road. When ever I run into someone from the past (like the 50th anniversary of my graduation from Pulaski High School recently) and they ask me where I live and I always inquire "Do you know where the Smart Bridge is?" Most everyone knows of it even if they don't live around here and I reply I live four houses down from the Smart Bridge on Ellett Road. They always know what I am talking about.
Comment by Georgia Compton — October 12, 2008 @ 6:55 pm
Blacksburg, home of the Smart Road, wastes millions on foolish and pointless restoration projects. At least the Smart Road research might, someday, save a life. And Blacksburg, please don't go down the path of Ithaca NY, a town poised to waste tens of millions of tax money on the so-called pod cars. We have enough lanes of traffic as it is.
Comment by afrocentric — October 12, 2008 @ 6:56 pm
Not being a local, I don't hold a grudge against Christian for not understanding the reason for any grudge others might hold relative to the smart road. You need to know the origins to understand that. If CT had checked into it a little, he would have found that the so-called Smart Road was the final, last-gasp incarnation of the desire of economic planners in Roanoke trying to establish a university in their backyard so that they could switch over from a dying railroad town to a vibrant tech community. The idea was that Blacksburg was supposed to be hampered by lack of access to an airport, and Roanoke was turned down when they asked the state to establish a university there (within 30 miles of the largest one in the state, no less). So next the farsighted Roanoke planners thought they might do the next best thing, pretend Blacksburg was actually a suburb of Roanoke and then claim the university was their own. Unfortunately, the distance problem was still there. So, why not build a very slightly shorter road between Roanoke and Blacksburg, bypassing the traffic jam that was already starting to form in Christiansburg due to the population shift in the county. OF course, Blacksburg was for it, if it would keep them from having to travel through Christiansburg to enter the real world at I-81. Roanoke was for it because it was mostly to be build by Montgomery County. No downside for them. People in Montgomery County were otherwise pretty sure they didn't need to spend that kind of money for a road that would cut the travel time between BBurg and Roanoke by a total of 6 minutes. Finally, somebody figured out that if they turned it into a research project, it would look like some direct benefit might come to the community. However, the BOS was still split, especially with one of their number having a direct conflict since part of it would go across his land. At last, newcomer supervisor Mary Biggs, as I recall, cast the deciding vote by basically saying she could not vote against a project that would bring dollars and jobs to the community. Well, I am pretty sure the construction project was carried out by an out-of-state firm, and pretty soon it was clear that VDOT had no intention of funding the boondoggle when the bypass from Bburg to Cburg and the new I-81 interchange was critical. So they built both. Only the so-called 2.2 mile road is actually only a mile long. The other mile is when you turn around at the end and come back. Meanwhile, it turns out that putting in that alternate 3a bypass and interchange project to Christiansburg solved the traffic problem which has continued to multiply as Blacksburg's anti-development actions continue to force potential residents out of town. It also turns out that the CRC draws economic development even without access to a decent airport. And it turns out that Roanoke's airport never became one with decent service anyway. Without a university and without a transporter to Blacksburg and VT, Roanoke declared itself the Technology Corridor and set up the Technology Council. Perception is reality to some folks, I guess. But Roanoke will finally get it's school, when they set up the new VT Medical School with Carilion. VT needs one to claw their way into the top 30 research universities, and Carilion needs one ... for some reason. Probably because they just have too much money and have to spend it somewhere.
So, CT, if you really wanted to know, a little digging would have turned all this up for you and you would have had a clue about why people in Montgomery County hold a grudge against the Smart Road, even though it is a moderately successful research project. I'm sure there is still SOMEBODY left there at the RT who knows the story.
Comment by NRJMike — October 12, 2008 @ 11:13 pm
Mike, you misunderstand. I knew all of that back story. I just find it a weak excuse to hold a grudge. If pent up hostility toward Roanoke and anger at road-routing and the supervisors is the best you have, well, that's not much. I'm sorry you can only look backward.
Comment by c. trejbal — October 13, 2008 @ 7:21 am
The only grudge I see here is the grudge that Roanokers have because of the bridge. Seems if CT agrees with Mike's back story, its clear that Roanoke is sore because they never got any 'closer' to VT. The road sure would have made Blacksburg and Roanoke 'closer' to one another, it hasnt happened yet, and there's the grudge folks. This article is simply a spin to try and make Blacksburg look like the fools for not connecting to Roanoke. Congrats for Blacksburg giving Roanoke a Thanks but no Thanks.
With the rampant heroin and cocaine use, the murders, robberies, dirty streets, etc. that Roanoke has offered would be visitors for the last 36 years or so i can remember, IMHO, if that bridge would have been completed, then you would REALLY have a 'Bridge to Nowhere'. Congrats for Blacksburg giving Roanoke a Thanks but no Thanks.
Comment by Marked Man — October 13, 2008 @ 8:04 am
Even if the connection were built, it would only shave a couple of minutes off the drive compared to the current route through Christiansburg. Sure, Roanoke would like to link more to Tech, and there will always be some links because the regional airport is there, because the new medical center is there and so on. But the whole connection question is, at this point, a red herring. VDOT went with 460 and the Smart Road is a research facility. Maybe it will be needed as a connector someday, but right now it's not.
Comment by c. trejbal — October 13, 2008 @ 10:54 am
I thought I remembered seeing somewhere that the Smart Road was a long-term expansion option, that would not connect to I-81 for some 20 years, and would serve to alleviate anticipated traffic growth on the bypass so it would not need to be widened. However, I also think it said that the connection would be done for a 2-lane road to I-81 by 2010, and then it would be 4 lanes by 2020...which is clearly not happening. But like CT just mentioned, it's the long-term idea, but in the near future it will continue to be a research facility.
Comment by Other John — October 13, 2008 @ 12:39 pm
NRJMike covered most of the history with the Smart Road and some of the reasons for the grudge -- but there is more to the story that has to do with local governments, sell-outs, and the 600-pound gorilla (VT) in the act. VDOT knew in the late '70s that U.S. 460 between Blacksburg and I-81 was inadequate, but it just applied bandaids to the problem (two left-turn lanes onto the C'burg bypass with traffic lights, etc.). Finally in the mid to late '80s a study was done to identify alternatives to improve the situation. About 20 routes/possibilities were identified, from "do nothing" to "improve existing road" to various roads parallel to the existing road, to several routes through the Ellett Valley all the way to I-81 at Ironto. The current route of the Smart Road was looked at but rejected by VDOT as too expensive and with too many issues. The "connect the bypasses" plan was adopted and plugged into the financing and construction schedule. Then, as Mike said, folks in Roanoke and Blacksburg thought a research project would be A Good Thing and decided the rejected route would be the best place for the new road. There was a lot of hard selling, quite a few lies, arm-twisting of local officials, promises made (and never fulfilled), and a bit of "if you aren't with us, you're against us" puffery. It was promised that the research would bring in $16 million a year, but the person making the claim didn't have any study or hard numbers to back this up and he later admitted this was just a "back of the envelope" calculation. There were issues about how the protected land in an agricultural and forest district had that designation removed by the Board of Supervisors, over the objection of the landowner. Paul Torgersen offered to swap a like amount of land that VT owns on Price Mountain to make good with the county on this, but this has never come to fruition. There were some supervisors who were reluctant to act, but who had a sudden change of heart. VDOT created a "citizens committee" to advise on the project (and it appointed some of the vocal opponents as an appeasement), but about the only input this committee had was on which side of the bridge piers would get the Hokie stone treatment. The "need" for the road was put up as future relief when the "connect the bypasses" road became clogged beyond capacity; most folks wondered why the new road couldn't be designed to deal with this from the beginning (like leaving space for additional lanes to be built when needed). The actual completion of the extra road to I-81 was also a nebulous concept and no one could explain how the vital research would be carried out on an active highway after everyone was used to working on a closed system.
While some of the dreams have come true and the Smart Road has proven to be a good research tool that has netted money for VT and the area, there is still a lack of trust of local officials generated from this project. Despite all that went on to get this road built and the hard feelings generated, local officials didn't get it and continue to function pretty much the same way -- planning in secret, puffing up projects to be more than they really are, ignoring citizen input, etc. The Smart Road was just the beginning of things, followed by the Toms Creek sewer issue in Blacksburg and recently the BoS fighting the intermodal facility and quashing the affordable housing project by doing nothing.
Bottom line is that the grudge isn't really against or about the Smart Road, it is about local government by good ol' boys and insiders.
Comment by Joe Hokie — October 13, 2008 @ 2:27 pm
Dear CT,
Yes, the Smart Road still comes up in conversations but not as a grudge. You brushed over the backstory which is vrey much related to current events as it relates to politics and fiscal thinking. I saved news clippings for years as the debate progressed. I tossed them a few years ago but I'm sure you might be able to find them.
I remember having some casual conversations with Mayor Hedgepeth about the cost and I predicted it would be x times larger than the selling price. How did that work out and have the percieved successes paid off the obligations of Montgomery County citizens yet?
Then there is the bonehead factor when the article came out that stated nobody considered where the water supply would come from to supply the snow making towers.
Politically, VT and the region have a love hate relationship. There seems to be some sort of land swap scandal involved in the controversial developments in the 31 years I've been a county resident. There is also the lingering thought about the fact that this Smart Road was put on a ballot and the voters said NO. Correct me if I'm wrong.
The only thing transparent about the facility is it's another big boys and their toys story. Yes, it's important to create jobs to create some illusion of usefulness for the graduating classes. I'm still in the dark about why this great expense was necessary and would love to see the list of research concepts and benefits to date. The anecdote by another poster about cameras on tractor trailers seems like a real stretch to justify this 50 million plus dollar Short Road and Bridge to Nowhere.
There was also discussion about duplication of facility. I believe someplace in California had already covered the concept and it's not difficult to imagine how many dumb empty roads could meet research needs. I live on a dumb gravel road that will not be improved because we need some road sensors to tell us it's raining and they have a safe place to play with robot cars.
It is a nice looking bridge and I like your idea about creating some new low paying service jobs to serve the geeks and cronies sucking on the grant teats.
When that money dries up, it would have been nice to have a road with a purpose greater than a monument to VT brilliance.
Comment by Jeffrey King — October 14, 2008 @ 8:58 am