Many problems with 95th bridge project

When our local government is running out of money, build the $33 million 95th Street bridge because:

A. It is needed. This one-mile, one-minute shortcut will service very few Naperville residents but does seem to be a great car and truck route for Bolingbrook traffic wanting to zip from Boughton Road down 95th Street to Route 59. It will relieve traffic off 111th and 119th streets, which are buffered truck routes now, and send the traffic in front of Neuqua High School and the library instead. No recent traffic study within the last 10 years indicates that traffic is snarled up at the Boughton and Naper/Plainfield light.

B. We’ll lose $8 million of U.S. “shovel ready” money. It will still cost Naperville, Bolingbrook and Will County $8 million each on top of the federal money to build this four-lane bridge with bike/walking lanes over this architecturally rich area of the DuPage River. If we don’t take the money someone else will get to build a meaningless project somewhere else and that would be a waste.

C. If we back out, Bolingbrook and Will County will sue us. Since these other powerful government entities often control Naperville policy and its politicians, we don’t want to upset them. It is necessary to push this project through to keep them and their ‘big money’ project lobbyist happy. We may save $8 million for our cash strapped city but we might have a six-figure legal bill — ouch.

I live in the south Naperville portion of Wheatland Township and, as a township trustee; I saw first hand the public anger and huge voter turnout at meetings over a township proposal to build a $2 million township building in this economy. This project is 15 times larger and every bit as unnecessary and untimely.

Joe Hudetz

Naperville