27 October 2016

Kalispell westside bypass

After a ribbon cutting ceremony, and the usual pork praising speeches by politicians claiming credit for bringing so much money and asphalt to Kalispell, the just completed northern section will open to traffic. Expect better weather than today, and expect a lot of law enforcement activity.

Adjusting the new traffic lights at the Three Mile bridge just before sunset on 25 October.

Although I thought, and still think, the bypass was a boondoggle, I’ll use it. But I’ll remember that for all the “progress” it represents, it came at a disproportionate price for some people, such as the residents of Empire Loop whose views to the east are now diminished or altogether blocked by a sound wall, and the residents on Barron Way who suffer the same fate to their west, and whose property values most likely are lower than before.

I live west of the bypass. All of the impacts on me are negative. My main route to Kalispell, Two Mile Drive, now has an overpass with a 3.5 percent grade that may be treacherous when icy. One of my favorite walking and bicycle routes included Parkridge Drive between Stillwater and Northland Drive. That section of Parkridge is closed forever, rent by the bypass and blocked by those ugly sound walls.

Both the InterLake and Beacon have published long, laudatory, stories on the bypass, treating it as a dream come true thanks to a community united behind a great idea. There has been little to no reporting on the disputes over where to locate the bypass — remember when the preferred route was Willow Glen Drive? — and the price paid by the people along the bypass. Perhaps such stories will be written eventually, but today both newspapers are wearing their local booster hats and shouting Hallelujah! along with community leaders and the people who profited from the project.