On Friday, November 8, the Minnesota Department of Transportation (MnDOT) held a virtual meeting of the Rethinking I-94 Policy Advisory Committee (PAC). The PAC is made up of elected officials from the communities that border the Rethinking I-94 project corridor, a 7.5-mile stretch of highway between Minneapolis and downtown Saint Paul that is up for redesign.
While these meetings are public, MnDOT does not provide recordings of the meetings. However, we attended and recorded the meeting and have made it available for you to watch in full.
The meeting covered many issues and included discussion about public access to PAC meetings and the ability of elected officials to influence the Rethinking I-94 project process.
“How did we land in a place where we are just a symbolic advisory board as elected officials?”
MnDOT staff took steps to limit the ability of PAC members and members of the general public to formally share their priorities for the project. For the second meeting in a row, MnDOT removed the live public comment period from the end of the meeting. MnDOT emphasizes the ability for us to write in public comments, but in requiring written comments, MnDOT essentially functions as a filter or middleman. The department blocks the public comments from the elected officials representing us.
Public comment had traditionally been allowed at PAC meetings as a way to allow community members to respond to the information that was shared and directly address MnDOT and elected officials. However, this decision by MnDOT removes that access.
MnDOT also went out of its way to clarify the intended role of PAC members. The stated role of the PAC is to “guide funding and policy decisions” for the project. Despite this, MnDOT Commissioner Nancy Daubenberger shared a slide at the beginning of the meeting that claimed “the PAC is not a voting body and does not pass resolutions.”
This did not sit well with PAC members. Minneapolis City Council Member Robin Wonsley, who displayed signs about the highway that were made by community members in her Zoom background, said “I have never been on an advisory board, nor have my constituents in the City of Minneapolis who are a part of our advisory boards, where I have not been able to have that autonomous decision making… How did we land in a place where we are just a symbolic advisory board as elected officials?”
State Senator Omar Fateh and Hennepin County Commissioner Angela Conley also shared their frustrations and called on MnDOT staff to create bylaws for future PAC meetings that restore public comment, set regular meeting times, and allow members to formally take up resolutions.
The ability for PAC members to consider and vote on resolutions is critically important. While MnDOT Metro District Engineer Khani Sahebjam clarified that the final decision on Rethinking I-94 would ultimately be made by the MnDOT Commissioner and the Federal Highways Administration (FHWA) Division Administrator, resolutions allow PAC members to speak up for their constituents and formally document priorities, concerns, and other feedback. While MnDOT wouldn’t be legally required to abide by a resolution, it would still have a major sway over the final project decision. For example, PAC members could vote on a resolution similar to what was recently passed by the Minneapolis City Council, which directed MnDOT staff to prioritize impacts on climate and environmental justice and requested the continued study of boulevard options.
This debate over the powers of the PAC shines a light on a broader issue, which is that there is no law that determines how advisory committees for major highway projects must operate. Our Streets and coalition partners have been leading the movement to pass legislation that would require MnDOT to create a PAC for all major highway projects. The law would give more power to community members and elected officials by requiring PAC members to vote and approve a major highway project before it can begin construction.
MnDOT brought in a consultant to fearmonger about traffic impacts.
The PAC meeting also included a short presentation from Texas based traffic consultant Jaimie Sloboden. While this segment was originally presented as an update about how MnDOT will be analyzing the traffic impacts among the different Rethinking I-94 design options, it quickly became clear that Sloboden was hired to drum up fear about the traffic impacts of replacing the freeway with an at-grade boulevard.
Sloboden took on the tone of a lobbyist, attempting to scare PAC members out of supporting the at-grade boulevard options by calling out I-94’s traffic counts following major downtown concerts and sporting events:
“So when we talk about repurposing (highways), there are other considerations. As you know in this corridor and the downtowns you have a lot of sporting events. As you think about repurposing, it is really important that you consider other things that might impact it… The point of this is to give perspective and a little bit more understanding about the freeway and how important I-94 is to the area.”
Sloboken made the ironic comparison to freeways in Florida and Texas, saying that extra lanes are needed there to accommodate hurricane evacuations.
The presentation slides emphasized how the at-grade boulevard would reduce trips and carry a significantly smaller amount of car traffic than the freeway options. Sloboken said the at-grade option would only serve 12.8 million trips per year, compared to about 58 million for the freeway, saying it “would leave us with about 37.5 million trips that would have to do something, go away, get displaced, use another mode option.”
This characterization of traffic impacts is incorrect and problematic.
It is inaccurate and misleading to claim that converting I-94 into an at-grade boulevard would reduce trips. A boulevard would decrease automobile trips. However, overall trips, including those made by public transit, walking, and biking, would likely increase. A boulevard would include new bus rapid transit with dedicated lanes, making it fast and convenient to take public transit. Neighborhoods would be reconnected and highway land would be repurposed for new homes, businesses, parks, and other destinations. This would make it significantly easier to walk, bike, or even drive to daily needs that would be located closer together. Car lanes, even those on a freeway, are extremely inefficient, and the best way to create vibrant cities is to reallocate traffic lanes into space for people.
Engineer Ian Lockwood’s 2021 presentation reiterates this point. Lockwood’s equation for vibrant cities suggests that land use & transportation planners should aim to increase the number of trips while decreasing the proportion of those trips made by automobiles. The gray boxes represent factors that are negatively impacted by freeways.
The claims made by Sloboken do not stack up with real-life data following completed highway removal projects and extended freeway closures. Traffic engineers predicted catastrophic congestion when freeways were closed for construction in Seattle and Philadelphia. When the Central Expressway was being considered for removal in San Francisco, Caltrans engineers predicted that a boulevard conversion would add four hours to commute times. However the gridlock and jammed neighborhood streets never materialized. Instead, the change in infrastructure incentivized change in behavior, reduced traffic, and improved quality of life. People drove less and took transit, walked, biked and worked remotely more. For those who continued to drive, many chained their automobile trips, shifted commute times, prioritized shopping closer to home, or utilized alternate routes. The end result is that we get what we build for.
Thankfully many PAC members recognized this and highlighted that reducing car travel on I-94 is something to celebrate, not fear. Given I-94’s racist and destructive history, accommodating car traffic to downtown sporting events should not be the sole determinant of the corridor’s future. Hennepin County Commissioner Angela Conley put it best by saying, “These trips exist because the highway is the way it is right now.”
MnDOT continued to dismiss air quality impacts.
Urban freeways like I-94 severely impact the air quality of surrounding communities, contributing to steep disparities in health issues like asthma, cancer, and dementia. PAC members and community members have consistently demanded that MnDOT improve transparency about air quality impacts and show how each project option will impact air quality before a design is selected.
As a result, MnDOT Noise & Air Quality Program Supervisor Natalie Ries joined Friday’s PAC meeting to share an update about how MnDOT will be measuring and evaluating the air quality impacts of the various Rethinking I-94 project options.
Ries said that the agency won’t be modeling localized impacts of air pollution, saying, “One question that we really have heard from people is ‘what would be the air quality in my backyard?’ and unfortunately the EPA air quality models just do not have the precision level to answer that question.”
Ries said MnDOT will continue to use the EPA’s MOVES model to measure air quality impacts, which has been their standard procedure. However, this approach is highly flawed for the following reasons:
- This approach focuses on regional impacts and does not consider the most severe impacts of air pollution for the people who live, work, and go to school closest to the freeway. Recent research has indicated that there is no safe level of air pollution, and regional indicators are not an effective measurement tool.
- The MOVES model has fundamental flaws that render it useless. The model does not account for induced demand, and the model uses assumptions based on the myth that highway expansion reduces emissions via congestion reduction. Ries said that the agency won’t be modeling localized impacts of air pollution:
Ries also shared that MnDOT would be convening a working group on air quality. However, it would only include technical experts and would not include community representatives. Council Member Wonsley pushed back on this, saying that community members deserve to be represented in the working group to ensure that their concerns about pollution impacts are addressed:
“It would be great to figure out how our residents, who are actually at the forefront of combating air pollution and air quality impacts through a variety of projects, can be integrated into initiatives like this such as a workgroup. I see those people as experts.”
Saint Paul Council Member Anika Bowie also shared her support for a community air quality working group and emphasized how state agencies need to step up to proactively measure pollution and protect residents.
Instead of solely relying on existing evaluation methods that are deeply flawed, MnDOT should utilize its air quality working group to collaborate with the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency to supplement the EPA’s model with localized air quality monitoring along the corridor.
Saint Paul Mayor Melvin Carter shared support for continuing to study the at-grade options.
Another major development during the meeting occurred when Saint Paul Mayor Melvin Carter weighed in and expressed support for continuing to study the at-grade boulevard options. This is a significant step and is a direct result of all of the Saint Paul residents who have taken the time to contact Mayor Carter.
Our Streets remains focused on building solidarity throughout the project corridor to co-create a vision for Rethinking I-94 that incorporates each community’s goals for reparations and a reconnected neighborhood. By supporting the continued study of the at-grade boulevard options, Mayor Carter is ensuring that Saint Paul residents can consider all possibilities for the future of their community.
Metro Transit shares a positive update about the Gold Line extension.
Metro Transit Deputy General Manager Nick Thompson joined the meeting to share a brief update about the recently announced Gold Line extension, which will now connect Woodbury with downtown Minneapolis.
While this project is an exciting and long-overdue step to improve transit service between the downtowns and the east metro, Our Streets has raised concerns that MnDOT may attempt to spin this project as a Rethinking I-94 compromise. Thompson mentioned that Metro Transit while the initial Gold Line extension will open in 2027, ahead of when Rethinking I-94 will break ground, the line will be adjusted to align with the outcome of the Rethinking I-94 process. This means that if I-94 is converted into an at-grade boulevard, the Gold Line could be adjusted to add new stations in neighborhoods like Rondo, Merriam Park, and Seward.
Take Action
MnDOT shared that the next PAC meeting will be held in January. In the meantime, you can take action by contacting MnDOT and Federal Highways Administration leaders to demand that MnDOT allow community members and their elected officials to have a meaningful voice during future PAC meetings.
Twin Cities Boulevard
Transportation is intersectional. Twin Cities Boulevard is a once-in-a-generation opportunity for reparative and environmental justice.