Making Seward Highway Safer Comes Down To Funding

State transportation officials want four lanes, but money is an issue

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By Lauren Maxwell
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Federal funding may play a big role in how safe the Seward Highway can be.

State transportation officials say they would love to make the deadly stretch of road between Anchorage and Girdwood a four-lane divided highway, but with a price tag that would exceed $600 million, that isn’t likely to happen soon.
 
“We don’t have a good crystal ball but we suspect that we are not going to get as much federal funding in the future as we are today,” says the Department of Transportation’s Kim Rice. “In developing the next step our instructions have been to reduce the amount of federal funding that will come to the state by 30%.”
 
But the state does have funding for several other safety projects that drivers should notice next summer.
 
Those include paving over ruts between Girdwood and Indian and fixing a dangerous curve at mile 88. Long-term projects include passing lanes and more pullouts but funding for those projects is still up in the air.
 
 
 
 

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points said on Tuesday, Aug 9 at 8:03 PM

$5K fine for every 5 over, 16 point on the license. When the useless tv forum was on I said mark up junk cars like cop cars and stage them around so dips won't know the real ones. Hell the cops stage at that 65-55 spot just before indian seems like only, how about moving?

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frozentoes said on Tuesday, Aug 9 at 3:16 PM

Concrete barriers in between the two lane highway seems like it would prevent most of the accidents, no? Why does DOT insist on four lanes?

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akrock said on Tuesday, Aug 9 at 11:27 AM

I think they ought to require everyone to go through a 6 month AST run defensive driving course prior to getting or renewing their drivers license in this state. They could use the tuition money to upgrade the highway. 6 months would cover almost all weather conditions and the people would get in the habit of safety without thinking about. Just a thought.

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Rain Man said on Tuesday, Aug 9 at 10:01 AM

Money solves alot if it is appropriated properly. Lots of places on the Seward and Glenn need to be fixed. 4 lanes makes alot on sense. Noting like being stuck behind someone going 45 in a BF RV and seeing them laughing and having a good ole time at your expense when they could easily pull over and then continue. I wonder how fast "SFETY JOE" was going. I'd bet that you were speeding if your able to so accurately predict how fast that bone head was driving. 80-90 is quite aways off from the speed limit. Oh well.

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Safety Joe said on Monday, Aug 8 at 8:25 PM

Just had an idiot in a Greenish Ford Explorer Licence FDE 471 pass me on a solid yellow line into an oncoming semi truck. He forced us both to take evasive action. This was on the Seward highway south of Turnagain Pass at around 10:00 p.m. last night. He was doing 80-90 MPH on wet rainy raods. Anybody you know? Let's not have these idiots on the roads any longer.

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dede said on Monday, Aug 8 at 7:35 PM

Making Seward Highway safer comes down to drivers! No matter how many improvements are made, if people keep driving impaired, ie. tired, drunk, distracted by cell phones, etc. it will not be any safer. Money does not solve everything!

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