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Jed Boal ReportingSupport for the stalled Legacy Parkway is gaining new traction online. A crash Saturday left frustrated supporters of Legacy Parkway focused again on the importance of another route.
When traffic on I-15 jams or shuts down in Davis County, you can wait a long time to get going again. A sixteen car pile-up shut down the interstate in both directions for nearly six hours.
Carlos Braceras, Deputy Director of UDOT: "It was a significant amount of time the main corridor was tied up. The local roads were significantly impacted. It was the only way people could get through, local roads."
Community leaders and emergency workers say the problem grows as traffic grows.
Gary Uresk, City Administrator of Woods Cross: "It becomes grid-locked. All of the streets stop or go to a very small crawl."
That slows local emergency services if there's a fire or someone needs an ambulance. Emergency crews are glad this crash happened on Saturday morning rather than Monday morning.
Jim Rampton, Dpty.Chief of South Davis Metro Fire: "We couldn't get helicopters in there, they wouldn't fly do to the fog. So now we got to get all of these people to the hospital and we're grid-locked."
One of the biggest frustrations since an environmental challenge and court order halted work three years ago, opponents have offered their own alternative. But this year backers came together as a group, Utahns FOR the Legacy Parkway, and launched a web site with a blog.
Gary Uresk, who goes by "build it now Dude” on the Blog, says it's a way to get their message out unfiltered, release some steam, and have some fun.
Gary Uresk, City Administrator of Woods Cross: "It's just a forum to let people know about our frustrations with the traffic and to get the facts out."
Funding for Legacy is not a sure thing, but the legislature will likely approve the 217- million dollars to complete the job. That would bring the price tag total to 685-million dollars. Whether UDOT gets the go ahead from the Army Corps of Engineers and faces any court delays will likely be determined this summer.
