Boulder City gets bypassed by federal, state agencies

Bill Erin

Thursday, Oct. 16, 2008 | midnight

There is no question about it, Boulder City has been hoodwinked and scammed by the Federal Highway Administration and the Nevada Department of Transportation. There's no other way to put it.

Briefly and without detail, this is the history of the Hoover Dam Bypass bridge and the Boulder City Bypass. The bureaucrats at FHA and NDOT wanted to divert traffic away from Hoover Dam and the bottleneck caused by traffic tortuously winding down U.S. 93 from Arizona to and across the narrow and tourist-congested dam.

There were several proposals for that. One was the current new bridge just south of the dam that included a bypass around Boulder City. A second was a bridge farther south in the Willow Beach area. A third was through or around Laughlin.

The Laughlin proposal really didn't have much backing. The route from Kingman to Laughlin is mountainous, slow and longer.

A Willow Beach bridge and highway over to U.S. 95 had a lot of backing. There were organizations and knowledgeable individuals who felt that was the quickest and easiest way to divert traffic from Hoover Dam.

The problem was the environmentalists. This vocal and influential group blocked that route across the desert because of the mountain sheep, desert tortoises and environment that it would supposedly damage.

The bridge and route just south of the dam was favored because, for the most part, environmental studies backed it, much of the route was already approved, and the business element in Boulder City favored it.

However, the organizations and residents who favored Willow Beach put up strong opposition. There was also a financial consideration. The funding was in the $600 million to $700 million area.

That's when the feds took the first turn of the screw on Boulder City. In order to get the funding, they separated the Hoover Dam Bypass and the B.C. Bypass into two projects.

"We'll get the funding for the Hoover Dam Bypass first. Then in a couple of years we'll get the funding for the Boulder City Bypass," they said.

Then came Sept. 11. Funding went down the drain, the Federal Highway Fund went broke, and infrastructure slid down the ladder of priorities. That's when the screw was really tightened on Boulder City.

How many voters are there in Boulder City? And they want $300 million to $400 million for a bypass? Go fish!

At the recent Sept. 23 meeting of the City Council, it got even worse. Now NDOT is saying that some of the traffic modifications on U.S. 93 that will keep us from becoming "the twin cities that built Hoover Dam" — one north of Highway 93 and one south of it — may slow down or even eliminate the need for a bypass.

There's too much detail for this column, but read the minutes on the Internet or watch the rerun on the Internet or BCTV Cox channel 2. A city-proposed overpass and grade separation at U.S. 93 and Lake Mountain Drive, necessary because NDOT would not approve a stoplight, might cancel the bypass.

The council threw up their hands at making decisions now and said, "We don't have enough information. Let's see what the impact is when the highway is opened."

The second guessers will have a field day with that one. However, as the presidential candidates say over and over, "I have a plan."

Next week, same paper, same space, I will reveal a plan to get around the warrants necessary to legalize traffic lights at Yucca Street and U.S. 93 and at Lake Mountain Drive and U.S. 93.

Sorry to make you wait, but what's a week when the feds and NDOT think 2025 is soon enough for a Boulder City Bypass?

Bill Erin is a Boulder City News columnist.