Pickerington Area Taxpayers Alliance

Rt 33 interchange issue

Recently material came to me regarding the housing starts that have hastily been approved by the City of Pickerington. It is clear to me (and has been abundantly obvious for some time with the rush to ?“Emergency Annex & potentially illegally zone former farmlands in the Diley Road corridor) that Diley is our area?’s next Route 256 nightmare.

Pickerington will use (and abuse) Diley Road for nothing more that a sea of subdivisions!

Now we come to the Pickerington Road / Allen Road debate. For those of you that are na?¯ve enough to not have paid attention to the past and have not followed the referendums you need to consider that there are lands along Pickerington Road that the City is also trying to make another sea of subdivisions (Steiger / Wirthman ?– 8185 Farms, etc.).

The topic of a diamond configuration interchange has been loosely presented here by one poster. If ODOT has its cheap alternative way of addressing the Pickerington Road Route 33 issue we will have created yet another bottleneck out of town with no one trying to get into town to establish jobs here. The diamond configuration alternative has much merit. The Pickerington Road only ODOT configuration has many pitfalls.

Pickerington Road only negative issues;

1. It exacerbates an already absurd residential building scheme.
2. Pickerington Road South of Route 33 has little long range potential due to bottlenecked constrains in and around the Village of Lockville.
3. Too much of Pickerington Road is already spoken for in residential ?“pre-annexation?” commitments.
** Conclusion ?– This hurts more than it helps.

Allen Road (only) issues;

1. While it opens lands for potential commercial development (land yet unaddressed with ?“pre-annexation deal?”s) it does not give a ?“large?” area for industrial / commercial development within the PLSD) ?– WHY, because the City of Pickerington has been and continues to be homebuilder happy on our best parcels.
2. It doesn?’t give a South of Route 33 access (today).
** Conclusion ?– It?’s better than Pickerington Road ONLY.

Diamond Interchange using Pickerington Road & Allen Road with overpasses at each;

1. For the long term viability of the area this option (though more costly) gives South of Route 33 access immediately (and allow for the potential development of a better south of Route 33 alternative with assisting development contribution monies in the future).
2. This configuration would give the potential for landowners, farmers and residential developers to see that their potential profitability of the developments of lands between Pickerington Road and Allen Road would be better suited for industrial / commercial development. We could get more acres of potential tax base widening industrial / commercial opportunities with this interchange configuration suggestion.
3. It equates to a better method of giving potential businesses a reason for coming here with alternative routes and avoids the mistakes of the past with the ?“only one way in and out?” poor planning that is evident with the Route 256 ?– Route 70 mistake.
** Conclusion ?– It is the best of many worlds it does cost more today but would bring greater returns in the future.

How to make it happen

*** What would be needed to make this happen?
a. Stop the building permit, zoning habits, and ?“potentially illegal?” pre-annexation deals along Pickerington Road. To do so obviously means that those in office that have supported such lunacy along Diley Road must be removed from decision making roles now!
b. Follow the monies that have already been and are being approved at the Federal levels for Route 33 improvements and get the Ohio Department of Transportation to consider these funds as part of the matching requirements.
c. Make ODOT understand that there is now more monies that they have at their disposal with the recent 6 cent per gallon gas tax hike that need to be used today for the better long range solutions.
d. Develop a better land use plan for this regions needs by local governments (again, remember the point of (a.) above).
e. Establish policies whereby the future land developers will contribute to the costs of our Interchange improvements. It is time to stop the practices that you can develop here and WE are going to pay for everything or rob our schools of the money you should pay into them. (Sorry Daryl if this excludes you in the development around Allen Road region.)

Submit FORMAL COMMENTS to ODOT

Based on the ongoing discussion it looks as though several leaders in the community have now grasped the split diamond concept that was put forth and its benefits. All parties to the discussion are encouraged to formally submit comments next week at the Public Meeting. Failure to do so will result in the lack of consideration of the concept. The more that comment on it and its benefits the better chance it has of being fully considered and adopted for implementation. Strive to establish/document that the cost to construct are outweighted by the benefits realized.

Thanks for the summary

Thanks, Bob, for summarizing the info for the Rt
33 interchange issue. I think there have been some
good ideas presented by all the posters, but I was
hoping someone would list the pros & cons of each.
I trust your expertise and knowledge of the ''over-
all'' picture.

By lin