Editorial: Big traffic woes in a little city

Friday, Jan. 13, 2006 | 8:02 a.m.

Boulder City officials fear construction of 108,000 new homes just south of the Hoover Dam in Arizona will ruin their small town's character with thousands of commuters heading to jobs in Las Vegas.

Boulder City, a small town built for Hoover Dam workers and their families in the 1930s, is everything Las Vegas isn't. Gambling is illegal. Liquor licenses weren't allowed until 1969. And a 1979 growth-control policy limits the number of new homes that can be built each year. The city's strategic plan says Boulder City "is committed to preserving its small town charm."

Thousands of commuters from large developments planned for Arizona's Mohave County just aren't part of that plan, city officials told the Las Vegas Sun earlier this week. Mayor Bob Ferraro said four Rhodes Homes developments -- to be built just south of the Hoover Dam and near Kingman, Ariz., 80 miles from Las Vegas -- are "going to be a major shock." Rhodes is marketing some of the homes as affordable, rural housing for Las Vegas workers, whose commutes could clog Boulder City's compact streets.

The outlook becomes even more bleak, Ferraro said, when it includes the scheduled 2008 opening of a bridge to bypass the Hoover Dam, which is expected to bring an additional 2,000 commercial trucks a day through Boulder City.

Kent Cooper, assistant director of the Nevada Transportation Department, told the Sun that a planned 10-mile freeway bypass for Boulder City won't be completed for at least 20 years, and that it is too soon to predict how Mohave County's thousands of new homes will affect Boulder City.

But now is the time to make such predictions and to act. This is not the first community to spring up along Southern Nevada's borders and create serious traffic problems. Thousands of Las Vegas Valley workers seeking more affordable or rural housing have built homes in Pahrump. Their long, daily commutes have created a traffic safety nightmare that Nevada Highway Patrol officials say has made State Route 160 between Las Vegas and Pahrump one of the state's deadliest stretches. Regional and state transportation officials now are scrambling to accommodate the increase.

We don't need more wrecks on the highway or more idling traffic fouling our air. Southern Nevada's agencies and elected officials must view development plans in other counties through a regional scope. They should establish strong ties with those making such decisions in Nye County, Arizona's Mohave County and other areas bordering Southern Nevada to ensure that what is built in these communities doesn't adversely affect residents here.