EVANSVILLE — Greg Wathen isn’t one to waste time. The CEO of the Economic Development Coalition of Southwest Indiana will be getting word out immediately that the new leg of Interstate 69, from Crane to Bloomington, is ready for traffic.
Transportation alternatives are paramount for companies looking to invest and expand, Wathen said, “and part of what we are doing next week is sending information out to site selection firms all over the country, letting them know it’s open, and this time next year, it will be open from Bloomington to Martinsville.”
As Wathen spoke, he was in his car driving the winding, woodsy two-lane stretch of Ind. 45 from Crane to Bloomington, headed for Indianapolis. It’s a 36-mile path those who travel between Evansville and the state capital have gotten to know well since November 2012, when former Gov. Mitch Daniels, on his motorcycle, zoomed up the newly completed 67-mile path from Evansville to Crane.
Finally, I-69 no longer dead-ends at Crane.
Maps since 2012 have shown a dotted line from there to Bloomington, signifying a highway under construction. Wathen said the new, unbroken line will show southwestern Indiana is open for business.
“This has moved at a pretty rapid clip for infrastructure,” Wathen said of I-69’s construction. “It sends a really positive message to companies that Indiana does pretty well in facing great infrastructure challenges, a very positive can-do message.”
University of Southern Indiana President Linda Bennett agreed, saying the extension of I-69 is about more than easing the drive from Evansville to Indianapolis — although that certainly is a key benefit.
She likes to think about the impact “beyond Indiana.”
“It puts Evansville on a major thoroughfare from Michigan down to Texas,” Bennett said. “It creates a new artery, and for the region in general, this is a good step forward. If you think about the advantages we have from rail and river, this now adds a major highway on the north-south route.”
Efforts to encourage new business startups along the I-69 corridor have been in place for the past few years, even before the Evansville-to-Crane leg opened three years ago. Naval Support Activity Crane, Growth Alliance for Greater Evansville, Work One and higher education institutions along the corridor have various partnerships to encourage innovation.
Bennett said the goal is to make I-69 “a corridor for development and innovation,” and that’s why partnerships related to I-69 began long before the highway opened.
Although it will be years before the highway’s full potential is realized, “if you can’t think with a distant goal in mind, you can’t get there at all,” Bennett said. “Because we’ve started the work now, it’s going to be a greater impact later.”
A completed I-69 will benefit Evansville Regional Airport, as well, according to Executive Director Doug Joest.
“It’s absolutely critical,” Joest said. “The fact that I-69 is open to the northeast makes the airport more accessible to people on the interstate. The commerce it creates and the economic activity along the route would do nothing but help us. We have been in regular meetings with airlines, both ones already here and others, trying to add routes and add service to our community, and we always use that as part of our pitch.”
Other communities along the I-69 corridor also want the new road to be a catalyst for good.
Pike County officials are raising money to construct the Elmer Buchta Entrepreneur and Technology Center, a business incubation center just off the highway. It will be specialize in computer-aided design and manufacturing.
“We are battling brain drain,” said Ashley Willis, executive director of the Pike County Economic Development Corp., and the new project’s goal is to help the community better retain its young talent.
“We’re really excited,” Willis said. “It’s a great time to work in economic development in Pike County.”
With I-69 completed from Evansville to Bloomington, and with the work from Bloomington to Indianapolis ongoing, officials in Indiana and Kentucky will continue to push for an Ohio River bridge linking Interstate 69 in southwestern Indiana to a network of roads that snake though western Kentucky and further south.
In July, the I-69 advocacy coalition BridgeLink proposed a modified version of the bridge that would trim its estimated cost from $1.4 billion to $800 million. The new design would have a four-lane rather than a six-lane bridge, with narrower shoulders. It would be 83 feet wide instead of 130 feet wide.
The new design also would shave three miles off a new I-69 connector that would tie the bridge with the road formerly known as Pennyrile Parkway in Henderson County. The Pennyrile has since been rebranded as I-69.
There is no timetable, though, for a bridge to be built.
“The BridgeLink team continues to meet on a monthly basis,” Evansville Mayor Lloyd Winnecke said. “We continue to bring it up to INDOT (Indiana Department of Transportation) and Gov. (Mike) Pence. I know our colleagues in Kentucky have had conversations with the governor-elect there (Matt Bevin).
To Wathen, a completed I-69 means economic momentum for the region.
“We forget sometimes how far south you can go with this,” he said. “We look at it not just as a road to Indy but something significantly greater. It connects the region, states and ultimately countries.”