No Need for Connector Road

By Geoff Gottlieb

Incredibly, the proposed Tribal Trail Connector (TTC) capital project is still alive, even though for the past four years virtually all the facts and data-based arguments made in relation to the TTC have come from parties who are concerned about its costs versus benefits to the community.

Those in favor of the TTC have been unwilling or, more likely, unable, to make any such argument, resorting to outdated and unsubstantiated assertions, such as “we need it for safety,” “it will alleviate traffic at the Y”, “we need it to protect our children,“ “we need it in the event of an emergency evacuation,” etc, etc.

County Staff, which is biased in favor of the TTC, even though it relies on the work of no less than three independent consulting firms at a cost to the county of approximately $730,000 this fiscal year alone, has failed to make up for this shortcoming, probably because there are no compelling benefits from the TTC to justify its financial and environmental costs. On this basis alone, the TTC project should be cancelled when the Commissioners meet on June 2 to vote on whether or not to proceed to the next planning phase.

If the Commissioners vote to proceed, then they should at least address some, if not all, of the reasonable arguments made to date by the parties concerned about the TTC’s impact on our community.

If that is too big an ask, they should at least have the decency to recognize that allocating another $1,000,000 to TTC planning is inappropriate on so many levels. The TTC has been reclassified as “non-essential”, and the expected loss of revenue due to the pandemic has required significant operating and capital budget cuts (which may mean the money is not there). Yet the Commissioners see fit to make this allocation while cutting essential services such as fire/ems. It is ironic that one of the key arguments made in favor of the TTC is safety, specifically redundancy for fire/ems. In addition, the County has yet to fill the open position of regional transportation director, which one would assume is important for the continued implementation of the recently updated ITP.

As published in the Jackson Hole News and Guide on March 20, 2020