Planners urge dropping Seward Highway and 5th and 6th rebuilds unless state's numbers add up

Anchorage's transportation planning staff want two major road projects, the Safer Seward Highway rebuild and the reconstruction of 5th and 6th avenues downtown, cut from the draft 2052 Metropolitan Transportation Plan unless the state can back up its numbers. The AMATS Policy Committee, which has final authority over the plan, votes Oct. 15, before the plan's 45-day public comment period starts.

In an Oct. 1 memo, Senior Planner Rhiannon Brown wrote that the state's figures for the highway project don't match AMATS's own numbers, and that no document shows where the downtown project's money would come from. State law requires the plan to be fiscally constrained, meaning expected revenue must cover every project on the list.

A state Department of Transportation and Public Facilities representative said projects left out of the plan can't use federal money. The AMATS Technical Advisory Committee recommended releasing the plan, with no member opposed, and removing the two projects if the department doesn't reconcile its figures and supply funding details.

The Seward Highway numbers

The Policy Committee voted 3-2 in July to put the Safer Seward Highway project back in the plan, over objections about its cost, its priority and whether the public had been heard. Mayor Suzanne LaFrance's designee voted yes, though LaFrance later called her support conditional. Assembly Member Daniel Volland voted no, saying he wanted the state to answer public comments first.

Brown's memo lists six discrepancies between the plan and the state's draft 2027-2030 transportation improvement program, known as the STIP. The STIP describes the project as running from Mile 98.5 to Mile 112, while the plan covers Mile 98.5 to Mile 118, and the project names and descriptions differ. For the first four of the project's eight stages, the STIP lists $981.1 million, compared with $815.9 million in the plan. Stage 4 alone is $465 million in the STIP and $343.6 million in the plan. With later stages added, the STIP totals $180 million more than the plan's $1.596 billion. The STIP also includes a $41 million preconstruction phase that was never provided to AMATS, with $14.5 million of it already obligated.

The 5th and 6th avenue rebuild

The downtown rebuild would narrow the one-way couplet that carries most traffic through downtown. Alaska News has reported cost figures of $293 million and $370 million for it this year, with no identified source for the extra money, and planning staff flagged possible scope creep.

The draft plan now lists $314.5 million for the stretch from L Street to Gambell Street, which the Policy Committee approved 5-0 in August, plus $30.5 million from Gambell to Airport Heights Drive, for $345 million total. It books $12.5 million in fiscal 2027, $16.5 million in 2029 and $285.5 million in 2030. "This is crucial as the funding is anticipated to be above and beyond the historical amount that comes into the AMATS area," Brown wrote.

LaFrance told the Assembly on Aug. 4 that her administration had worked with the department to direct $260 million more in federal funds to the project.

Public comment on the state's draft STIP runs through Oct. 29.

Editor's note: This story was updated to add background from Alaska News's earlier reporting on both projects and to reorganize it for clarity.