A billion here, a billion there....

and we're soon talking about real money. So goes the saying in Washington politics. It also applies here in Florida when it comes to the Florida Department of Transportion or DOT. 16 years ago I-595 a connector expressway was built in Broward County. It runs from the western suburbs to Port Everglades. At the time it was the most expensive road project in Florida, costing 1.3 billion dollars.

Guess what? The DOT wants to spend another 1.03 billion to improve the road and fix poorly designed interchanges. This will take 10 years and won't start till 2010. Our govt. couldn't do it right the first time, so they want another shot. Typical isn't it? When are highways ever built to match present needs? Never it seems, I-95 was over capacity the day it was completed down here. More taxpayer dollars down the toilet and more construction to cause travel nightmares. And some wonder why you have to be a masochist to live here.

Open Post- Don Surber, Bright & Early, Jo's Cafe, Pursuing Holiness

Whether you're headed east in the morning or west in the evening, the crush of commuters takes the rush out of rush hour on Interstate 595.

It's been that way almost from the day the $1.3 billion highway opened in 1989, the most expensive highway project ever built in Florida at the time.

Starting in 2010, planners will get another crack at relieving Broward County's east-west commuting woes with an ambitious makeover of I-595 that would take a decade to complete and cost more than $1 billion.

The Florida Department of Transportation will hold a public hearing Tuesday on the plans.

Among the first priorities will be eliminating the tricky S-curve from westbound I-595 to northbound Florida's Turnpike -- the scene of a fatal gasoline tanker crash that killed four people in February -- with a more direct ramp.

The missing link of State Road 84 also would be built parallel to I-595 between State Road 7 and Davie Road, eliminating the need for local traffic to get on the interstate.

"One of the big problems we have now is traffic that has to get on 595 to travel short distances," said project manager Steve Braun.

Tischa Weathers, who commutes along I-595 from Davie to downtown Fort Lauderdale, said she wishes the entrance ramps from the turnpike continued all the way to I-95 instead of forcing drivers to merge.

"As it is now, there is a bottleneck," Weathers said. "Coming home, the beginning of the rush, I am always so thankful that I get to exit 595 at the turnpike, before the masses heading to west Broward."

Braun said Weathers and other commuters like her will get their wish with a new road system that will parallel I-595 and move entrance and exit ramps at Davie Road, the turnpike, S.R. 7 and S.R. 84 away from the main flow of traffic.

The so-called "collector-distributor" road system will look and function similar to lanes that parallel I-95 south of Broward Boulevard.

Daniel King of Fort Lauderdale said he'd much rather see the money for I-595 spent on creating an east-west interstate in northern Broward County, maybe along McNab or Copans roads.

"If I have to go on Commercial Boulevard from the Sawgrass [Expressway] to Dixie Highway, it's a toss up. Do I try Commercial and deal with the stop lights, or do I go all the way down the Sawgrass to 595 and then come back up 95 to Commercial?" said King, a truck driver.

By February, the state will choose between two options being considered for improving I-595.

The first would put two reversible express lanes in the median of I-595 and preserve a path for elevated light rail trains between eastbound I-595 and eastbound S.R. 84. The cost is $1.04 billion, including $530 million for road improvements and $514 million for mass transit.

The second would put the light rail in the median and build three reversible express lanes on top, including a direct connection to the turnpike. Cost is $1.14 billion, including $827 for road improvements and $320 million for mass transit.

Land costs for both options are $160 million. The mass transit costs reflect only the amount required to build the portion that would parallel I-595, not the full line that would swing through Fort Lauderdale along S.R. 7, Broward Boulevard, Andrews Avenue and U.S. 1.

Braun said the state has accumulated about $400 million to fully fund design work for eight of about a dozen I-595 projects in addition to a portion of the construction and land costs.

In addition to the new road system between I-95 and Davie Road and the missing link of S.R. 84, both options would build "braided" ramps that take entering traffic over or under exiting traffic. They also would add bridges to carry S.R. 84 in both directions over Hiatus Road and eastbound over Pine Island Road.

At its most congested point, I-595 currently handles about 180,000 vehicles a day.