Seven Southwest Washington legislators want to resurrect plans to build a new Columbia River bridge linking Portland and Vancouver.
Just don’t call it the Columbia River Crossing.
Vancouver-area lawmakers will drop bills Friday labeling a new I-5 bridge a project of statewide significance and directing Washington Transportation Department officials to sift through millions of dollars worth of feasibility studies, environmental impact statements and financial analyses from the last go-round to determine what could be salvaged of the abandoned interstate bridge project.
Sen. Annette Cleveland, D-Vancouver, acknowledges that she’s leading a long-shot effort. Neither Washington Gov. Jay Inslee nor Oregon officials are fully on board. The last CRC effort died in the fiery ashes of partisan rancor after hundreds of millions of dollars were spent.
Cleveland refrains from even uttering the words Columbia River Crossing. The bills refer only to a new Interstate 5 bridge. Whatever its called, she insists, the current bridge is obsolete and not dealing with it “would be really irresponsible.”
“We have an aging piece of infrastructure that needs to be replaced,” she said. “It is limiting our ability to grow our economy, to move freight. We have a future generation that is expecting us to act responsibly.”
Cleveland’s bill would free up $365,000 to fund the work of gleaning through the mountain of CRC paperwork to determine what work is obsolete and what can be retained.
The bill is silent on the controversial topic of light rail, which gave conniptions to Clark County conservatives the last time around. The bill says only “all of the potential mass transit options” are to be considered.
Cleveland has been working the Southwest Washington delegation for a year to restart the bridge project. She managed to convince seven of the area’s nine lawmakers to join the effort, including conservative Republican Ann Rivers, who claimed some credit for killing the project last time.
Inslee reportedly told Cleveland he would consider supporting the project only if there was a consensus among the Southwest Washington delegation.
The Columbia River Crossing, in development for more than a decade, was to include light rail into downtown Vancouver, bike and pedestrian lanes, a new bridge and a significantly widened freeway and multiple new interchanges along a five-mile stretch of I-5. The federal government agreed to kick in more than $1 billion, more than a third of the estimated cost.
The light rail and plans to charge tolls inspired a conservative, anti-government backlash.
Washington pulled out of the project in the summer of 2013. Oregon tried for months to complete the project on its own but eventually gave up in March 2014.
By then, project sponsors had spent $190 million.
It was a stunning loss for then-Gov. John Kitzhaber and House Speaker Tina Kotek, both Democrats, who continued to fight for the project nearly to the bitter end. They were backed by Oregon’s mainline business and labor organizations, which argued the $2.8 billion project would create hundreds of jobs, improve a congested, accident-prone stretch of I-5, and boost the regional economy by smoothing freight mobility.
Cleveland acknowledges she faces a tough sell in her own turf and also in Oregon. Washington generated significant ill will in Oregon when it abandoned the CRC.
Oregon lawmakers are expected to consider their own transportation funding package in their new session. A new I-5 bridge across the Columbia is not included.
— Jeff Manning
503-294-7606, jmanning@oregonian.com
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