INDIANAPOLIS —A Bloomington group's transportation plan has to include the Interstate 69 extension in order to receive state approval, the Indiana Department of Transportation head has told the group.
Michael Cline, the state's transportation commissioner, rejected the Bloomington/Monroe County Metropolitan Planning Organization's updated transportation plan because local opponents of the 142-mile Indianapolis-to-Evansville highway project had it chopped out of that plan.
It's the latest twist in a standoff over a stretch of the highway that is less than two miles long. The state needs Bloomington to ultimately include that portion in its plans, and Bloomington needs to avoid the potential consequences – such as losing funding for local projects – that could come if it does not accede.
Cline wrote that the state's objective is to find a transportation plan on which INDOT and the Bloomington group can agree, and "the inclusion of I-69 is an integral part of such a plan."
He also chastised the MPO because, he said, it violated its own bylaws that require all amendments to transportation plans to be posted ahead of time.
A spokesman for Bloomington Mayor Mark Kruzan, who is on the MPO's committee that dropped I-69 from its plans, did not return a call seeking comment.
In May the Bloomington MPO – a group created by federal law and responsible for coordinating transportation projects in its area – stripped the highway out of this year's update of its plans.
In order to receive federal funds, all road-building projects must be included in the transportation plans of any such organization through which the roads would pass, in addition to regional and state plans.
Therefore, stripping section four, which would stretch from the Crane Naval Surface Warfare Center to the Bloomington area, from the plan was an effort to use what leverage the city's opponents of the project had to force some changes.
But before the Bloomington MPO's new draft could become official, it had to receive approval from INDOT. Commissioner Michael Cline told Bloomington in a letter last week that he would not grant that approval.
He said the MPO's move to drop I-69 from its plans was "uncooperative," and that the 142-mile Indianapolis-to-Evansville highway project must be part of the group's plans if it wants to receive the state's approval.
Still, that's not the end of the ordeal.
Until the standoff over the latest draft of the Bloomington MPO's transportation plan is resolved, the state is using in its place one the group approved last year. That includes planning for the I-69 project, but it does not include construction.
Each MPO's plans must be updated once every four years. That means the state is on solid footing for planning I-69 through the area through 2013, but before construction can begin in the small portion that passed through the territory covered by the Bloomington MPO, it must be included in an updated set of the group's plans.
Will Wingfield, an INDOT spokesman, noted that Cline's letter said the process must be "cooperative," and that the state is seeking to work through its differences with the MPO.
Kruzan, meanwhile, told The Associated Press that he sees the state making little effort to strike a deal. "It leaves no room for compromise while claiming to want compromise," Kruzan said.
The first three sections of the I-69 project, which range from Evansville to Crane, are already under construction and are expected to be completed by the end of 2012.
The fourth section – the one the Bloomington group is seeking to block – is expected to be done by the end of 2014. The state finished its planning work in July, and is now awaiting a federal record of decision.
The last two sections would run along the current path of Indiana 37 from Bloomington to Indianapolis. No timeline has been set for its completion.