THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, October 23, 1995 TAG: 9510230051
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B5 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Medium: 60 lines
Several local officials have reacted coldly to a private partnership's plan for a toll road that would be the final stretch of state Route 288 west of Richmond.
``We already have one too many toll roads,'' said Chesterfield County Supervisor Arthur S. Warren.
Route 288, in the planning for years, was given new urgency by Motorola Inc.'s plans to build a $3 billion computer chip plant in Goochland County that is expected to employ up to 5,000 people.
James River Parkway Associates, a venture between the engineering and contracting firms that built the Dulles Toll Road Extension in northern Virginia, is circulating a plan among local officials to finance and build the 17.5-mile stretch. It would go through Chesterfield, Powhatan and Goochland counties.
Local motorists already have to pay to drive on the Powhite Parkway, which extends from west Richmond to northwest Chesterfield. One-way tolls on the Powhite total $1.10.
``I've got some real concerns about imposing what I consider an additional tax on the people of Chesterfield and Powhatan, the people who would be using that road,'' said Del. John Watkins, a Chesterfield Republican whose nursery company owns between 50 and 100 acres which Route 288 would cross.
The proposed toll road has been tentatively labeled the James River Parkway and is expected to cost $255 million. The company has no estimate of tolls for drivers.
The segement of Route 288 through southern and central Chesterfield already has been built. But construction money has yet to be appropriated to link it from the Powhite north to Interstate 64 in Goochland.
A new Virginia law, the Public-Private Transportation Act of 1995, opens the door for private firms to build or maintain traditionally public transportation projects.
Dewberry & Davis, a northern Virginia-based engineering firm, and Brown & Root Civil Inc., a Texas-based contractor, formed James River Parkway Associates to propose the 288 toll road.
Robert E. Martinez, Virginia's transportation secretary and a chief architect of the Public-Private act, declined to comment on the parkway idea because his department has not received a formal proposal.
Construction, including a bridge over the James River, would take 2 1/2 years, after an approval process that would take about a year, a James River prospectus said.
But a segment between state Route 6 and U.S. 250, running past the Motorola site, could be completed sooner.
Motorola officials said Saturday they were unaware of the toll road possibility.
Jody Bolstad, a Motorola spokeswoman, said the company has not involved itself in the planning for 288. by CNB