Meeting addresses questions on U.S. 95 work

Friday, April 26, 2002 | 10:58 a.m.

Residents in or near the path of the U.S. 95 expansion project came to a public meeting Thursday to find out what will happen to their homes -- and when.

The Nevada Department of Transportation held the meeting for those who still have questions about the roadwork after a decade of sometimes contentious discussion and planning. The meeting specifically focused on the section of highway between Valley View and Martin Luther King boulevards.

The roadwork will increase the width of the highway from six lanes to 10.

Those residents who came to the meeting were by and large resigned to the expansion, although some expressed concerns about the project's impact.

Terry Rogers has lived on Amber Circle for 22 years. His house will stay, but his neighbor's home is in the roadwork right-of-way.

"I just hate to lose good neighbors," he said. Rogers and other residents of the older neighborhood south of the highway are hoping that a planned sound wall will be big enough and tough enough to keep traffic noise out.

Rogers, a pharmacist, said he has no plans to move, regardless of the construction.

"I'm not going anywhere," Rogers said. "My wife passed away in that house -- I will too."

Some of those living near the highway now will have no choice but to move. Their homes are in the middle of the rights-of-way for the expanded road or the on- and off-ramps.

Sam Cuzela has lived in his home on Dahlia Lane for nearly 30 years. While some residents are mourning the loss of their homes, Cuzela said there are good and bad points to moving.

He said his home requires a lot of maintenance, repairs and upkeep -- costs Cuzela will not mind leaving behind. But Cuzela does not believe that the buyout deal from the Nevada Department of Transportation will be enough to purchase a new home, free and clear.

That means Cuzela will have to get a mortgage. The house he lives in now is paid off.

Cuzela and other residents in the rights-of-way said they are still waiting for an appraisal from the highway agency and its contractors.

"They haven't given us any number, even a date when we will have to leave the house," said Martha Santanilla, who has lived in her house for 25 years. The eastbound exit ramp off the highway is slated to go directly over her home.

Santanilla is one of those who approach the move with mixed feelings.

"It feels good, but sad at the same time," she said. It could be good to move to something new, she said.

"But it's a house you've been in for many years, and you have many good memories."

Many of the residents who will be affected by the roadwork said they are not overly concerned with a Sierra Club lawsuit, filed Monday, that would force the Federal Highway Administration, the funding agency, to do more environmental work on the road.

The Sierra Club is arguing that the federal and state agencies should reopen the environmental assessment process based on research that indicates living near busy highways poses a health risk.

But Rogers, who will live next door to the expanded highway, said the health risk "doesn't worry me at all."

"There is a risk of cancer in everything you do," he said.

Federal and state officials believe that the lawsuit is designed to delay the highway work, which they argue is necessary to handle increasing traffic demands.

Leana Hilderbrand, an activist with the local arm of the Sierra Club, said that is not the environmental group's intention.

"It's all about mitigating the environmental effects," Hilderbrand said. "Take a look at the research and see if it can be integrated into the expansion."

The $440 million project is designed to come in phases. The expansion from Valley View to Martin Luther King should be complete, agency officials say, by 2005.

A meeting next month will focus on the highway between Valley View and Washington Avenue, a section that includes the infamous "Rainbow Curve," a mile-long turn in the highway where traffic is often congested. Work on this section should be complete by 2006.