Back in 2019, after the Eastern Shore Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO) voted to remove the I-10 Mobile River Bridge and Bayway project from its Transportation Improvement Plan (TIP), Gov. Kay Ivey declared the project “dead.”
Since then, there has been some commentary from elected officials on how to proceed. However, there has been no official movement on the controversial project.
During an interview with Mobile radio’s FM Talk 106.5 on Friday, Mobile Mayor Sandy Stimpson urged local officials to reengage on the project and find an acceptable solution.
“Well, as you know because you have interviewed a lot of the political leaders and others that have talked about conversations that have been ongoing about what is it going to take to get it back on everybody’s agenda, to get the governor and ALDOT reengaged — you know, working with the Mobile County and the Eastern Shore MPO to come up with a plan that is acceptable to the citizens and the community in general,” he said. “Those conversations have been going on, but there’s no engineering drawings. This is conceptual at this point in time. But we have got to do something to move this project forward because so much is at stake.”
“Really, it is a congestion problem,” Stimpson continued. “Really, you find our trucks that are carrying our commerce or our citizens are locked down in traffic, and it is congested. I mean, that is slowing down our economy, congestion our economy.”
Stimpson said the congestion troubles plague more than just traffic traveling Interstate 10 across the Mobile Bay, but thoroughfares in Downtown Mobile as well. He included Government Street and Water Street, which are conduits to the long-existing Bankhead Tunnel, which offers access to the I-10 Bayway and the U.S. Highway 90/98 Battleship Parkway Causeway.
“Those merchants in Downtown Mobile, there’s a time of day they can’t do business because of gridlock,” he added. “It’s much worse than that in so many areas.”
Stimpson also defended Ivey, who has had critics for her administration’s handling of the toll bridge saga.
“Let me make a comment about that,” he explained. “It’s been going on for 20 years. I think I was the chairman of the Chamber of Commerce in maybe 2010, and I started participating in groups going to D.C. about this project back then — talking to DOT and FHWA, talking to senators’ offices. You know, ALDOT has been engaged in this since before Governor Ivey. Obviously, when you have a controversial subject, people can make it a hot potato. And I think there is undue criticism that has been thrown at Governor Ivey about this. She recognizes the need for his. But she also recognizes that southwest Alabama has to get their act together in order to make this happen.”
“So, it’s really incumbent upon the two MPOs because that’s where it came to a screeching halt last time,” Stimpson continued. “It’s incumbent on the two MPOs to get together, work with ALDOT, come up with a feasible plan that’s acceptable. And part of that feasible plan is that there needs to be a no-toll situation. And I’ll say it — the legacy part of this — the Wallace Tunnels, the Bankhead Tunnel, the Africatown-Cochrane Bridge — you know, people are expecting there to be no toll on those thoroughfares. We need to come up with a plan that embraces that.”
@Jeff_Poor is a graduate of Auburn University and the University of South Alabama, the editor of Breitbart TV, a columnist for Mobile’s Lagniappe Weekly, and host of Mobile’s “The Jeff Poor Show” from 9 a.m.-12 p.m. on FM Talk 106.5.
