Belt loop studied for airport access
Residents are invited to provide public comment at a meeting tonight on the first proposal, dubbed the Provo west-side connector. The connector would create a new three-mile road that would cut east to west through southwestern Provo from the airport to the University Avenue I-15 interchange.
The meeting is a first step in an environmental impact study being conducted by Provo with help from UDOT and the Federal Highway Administration. The meeting is scheduled from 5 to 7 p.m. at Amelia Earhart Elementary, 2585 W. 200 South.
"That property on the west side is sacred property to a lot of families who have owned it for decades," Mayor Lewis Billings said. "We encourage people to come in and tell us about issues."
The second proposal is Provo's idea for an alternative to UDOT's study on the future of Geneva Road. Plans to widen the road have come and gone over the past decade, but UDOT is considering widening Geneva Road to as many as five lanes north of Provo.
Provo Mayor Lewis Billings told the City Council this week that he'd like to see UDOT and the city split off the new traffic that would come to Provo on that road to a new road that would go in near Utah Lake, west of all the existing development north of Center Street, and connect to 3110 West to provide flow north and south to the airport.
"With all the population growth on the west side, we need more access," Provo Community Development Director Gary McGinn said. "This would be a sort of belt loop to the airport and would connect traffic from the south without putting too much on Geneva Road and Lakeshore Drive."
Billings has long touted the Provo Municipal Airport as a future home to regional commercial airline carriers. The airport's new air traffic control tower is proof of the growing air traffic in and out of Provo. Brigham Young University's football team regularly flies large charter jets out of the airport, which also serves as a backup for jets diverted from Salt Lake International.
No routes have been selected for either of the proposed roads that would make up the belt loop. Planners are considering making the west-side connector a four-lane road from the airport to the University Avenue interchange, but public input in the environmental impact study will help determine the route for the west-side connector through southwest Provo.
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