Thursday (Feb. 26) was an important day for Brazoria County and its transportation issues.
A contract between the Texas Department of Transportation (TXDoT) and Blueridge Transportation Group was approved by the Texas Transportation Commission that will allow Blueridge to build, operate, maintain and collect tolls on the planned tolled lanes on the Harris County portion of Hwy 288 for the next 52 years.
“This was a great financial deal,” said Brazoria County Engineer Matt Hanks. “Not only will this developer take care of the toll lanes, but it is going to construct eight direct connectors to Beltway 8 and do most of the improvements needed to the 610 interchange. Plus, they got $27 million. It’s a win for them and it’s a win for us.”
TXDoT and Harris County are responsible for the toll lanes from Hwy 59, extending south to the Harris County line at Clear Creek. Brazoria County is taking on the lanes south of that line.
“One major accomplishment of the agreement was the inclusion of direct connectors from Pearland to the Houston Medical Center,” said State Representative Ed Thompson. “As you all know, a large number of Med Center employees are Pearland residents who daily make the commute downtown via State Highway 288.
“This is going to help our communities immensely and will allow folks the ability to travel back and forth with ease. Roads are our one of our best economic development tools, and we will certainly see these benefits with the Med Center and the Port region. I am incredibly pleased with this outcome, as many people worked so hard to come together and make this happen,” said Thompson.
“It was a big day for us because our project could not go forward until we knew what Harris County was going to do. We’d like to finish our part of the project around the same time Harris County finishes. If TXDoT had received nothing, then the project could have been put on hold,” added Hanks.
The project is expected to begin construction in late 2016, with the opening of the route in late 2018.
