By DOUG WILSON
Herald-Whig Senior Writer
HANNIBAL, Mo. -- Members of the Missouri Highways and Transportation Commission did not have to go far to see why some speakers at the panel's monthly meeting say the region's top highway priority is the U.S. 61 Relocation project. Traffic stopped and started along the Avenue of the Saints/U.S. 61 in Hannibal within sight of the Hannibal-LaGrange University building where the commission met Wednesday morning. The seven stoplights in Hannibal represent a bottleneck for through traffic that travels along more than 500 miles of the four-lane highway between St. Louis and St. Paul, Minn. Regional transportation supporters urged the commission to build a bypass they call the Hannibal Relocation. "The goal of realigning U.S. 61 to the west of Hannibal was agreed on as one of the top 10 regional priorities in 1984," said Thomas A. Oakley, speaking on behalf of the Tri-State Summit. A 1996 study by the Missouri Department of Transportation warned that Hannibal streets would become clogged and accident rates would climb when the Avenue of the Saints was completed -- as it was in 2009. Those problems have arisen and traffic has been even greater than projected in 1996 after the new Mark Twain Bridge was completed in 2000, U.S. 36 was completed as a four-lane highway connecting with Interstate 72 and the Chicago-Kansas City Expressway was completed in 2010. "What the people who prepared this (MoDOT) report did not know at that time and could not have known was that in the next 14 years ... that a new interstate bridge would be built and opened and that three major new national corridors would be built and finished, and they would all cross in the city of Hannibal," Oakley said. On maps, that puts Hannibal in the crosshairs. That's a good thing for economic development, but a bad thing for traffic congestion. Tom Boland, a Hannibal businessman and former chairman of the state Transportation Commission, said the proposed 10-mile bypass would direct much of the commercial traffic around Hannibal to the west. It would speed travel for truckers and other drivers using the four-lane expressway and relieve congestion within Hannibal for residents, local employees, shoppers and tourists. MoDOT District Engineer Paula Gough said hosting the Missouri Highways and Transportation Commission gave the region a chance to highlight local transportation needs. "We do have some challenges of â how do we handle this crossroads of the transportation system'" including river, rail and air travel as well as highways, Gough said. Members of the U.S. Highway 54 Coalition also lobbied for upgraded lanes between Mexico, Mo., and Louisiana, Mo. -- dwilson@whig.com/221-3372
