XNA officials mull access road options

HIGHFILL -- Regional airport officials have estimates for the cost of an access road and now have to figure out if they want to pay more to avoid dealing with a threatened species, the snail darter.

"As it happens, the least expensive route also has the environmental impact, the snail darter," said Rick Dunkleburg, a consultant on the project from CH2M.

TSA Recognizes Partnership Efforts

Gilbert Neil, public safety director at the Northwest Arkansas Regional Airport, is one of only three individuals nationwide to be recognized by the federal Transportation Safety Administration for work assisting the agency. Neil was recently presented with the agency’s Partnership Award. Neil is the security coordinator for the airport with the TSA and was nominated by the TSA security director for Arkansas. There are more than 450 commercial airports nationwide.

Source: Staff report

The access road is expected to be a restricted highway about 4 miles long and will connect near where the first phase of the U.S. 412 Northern Bypass intersects with Arkansas 112, between Cave Springs and Elm Springs. The airport has about $14 million in federal money for the estimated $30 million project and is working to find the rest.

Airport officials hope to have the long-awaited access road built and open by spring or summer 2019, if all goes well.

Northwest Arkansas Regional Airport Authority board members were presented Wednesday with two alternatives and two potential routes.

Alternative A would construct two lanes initially but clearing all the right-of-way and earthwork would be done to allow two lanes to be added about 2030, according to traffic demand forecasts. It would be much like the approach being taken with the Bella Vista Bypass.

Alternative B would construct all four lanes with all the required infrastructure from the get-go.

Both proposed routes run from the U.S. 412 Northern Bypass, which is under construction, around the west side of Cave Springs to the airport entrance, following roughly the same path.

Starting with two lanes on one of the routes and adding two lanes in 2030 has an estimated price tag of $80.9 million. Constructing four lanes initially would cost about $73.6 million.

Starting with two lanes on the other route and adding two more lanes in 2030 would cost some $72.3 million. Starting with four lanes would cost an estimated $65.9 million.

The first proposed route would require more dirt work -- and cost $7.5 to $8.5 million more -- but would have less environmental impact than the second route, which would run through snail darter habitat and could require expensive environmental mitigation efforts to protect snail darter habitat as well as dealing with U.S. Fish and Wildlife.

"The snail darter is a critical threshold species. You have to mitigate the impact on it," Dunkleburg said. "Mitigation may cost more than going to another alternative. A lot of times it's easier to just go to another alternative."

Both proposed routes lie outside the Cave Springs Recharge Area, an environmentally sensitive area that is home another threatened species, the Ozark Cave Fish.

"We deliberately looked at areas outside the recharge area so we'd have no direct impact on the cave fish," said Scott Van Laningham, executive director of the airport.

Another issue involves the "magic mile." The access road, regardless of which alignment is chosen, is projected to intersect with the U.S. Northern Bypass about a mile west of the Arkansas 112 interchange. Construction of the first phase of the bypass is expected to extend only about one-half mile west of the interchange. Airport and state highway officials have not determined who's going to pay for that half-mile section in between.

"We'll do it if needed and turn it over to the highway department," Van Laningham said.

The work would add about $7 million to $8 million to the total cost of the project.

NW News on 01/21/2016

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