Webster Groves Portion of South County Connector Sparks Opposition

Just the idea of homes being taken to allow a north-south connector for South County motorists to reach mid-county had scores of Webster Groves residents up in arms Wednesday.

A public presentation of the South County Connector Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) drew residents to Wednesday evening. The EIS was the subject of a earlier this month at the Affton White-Rodgers Community Center in Affton.

The EIS is being carried out among the St. Louis County Department of Highways and Traffic, the Missouri Department of Transportation (MoDOT) and the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA). The intent of the EIS is to find a way to alleviate traffic congestion in some mid-county areas and create a more direct route from South St. Louis County to Mid-St. Louis County.

Five alternative routes were displayed for an area that is generally bounded by Manchester Road on the north, Hanley Road and Laclede Station Road to Interstate 44 on the west, Murdoch Avenue and Watson Road to the south and Big Bend Boulevard and River Des Peres to the east. The study area includes parts of Maplewood, Webster Groves, Shrewsbury and the southern and southwestern portions of the City of St. Louis.

What has Webster Groves residents concerned is that four of the alternative map plans show a small portion of the northeast section of the city that includes Tuxedo Boulevard, Key West Avenue, Kuhlman Lane and Barbara Jean Court, all of which are between North Laclede Station Road and Big Bend Boulevard, as being used for new road alignments. (The accompanying PDFs detail proposed routes).

Tori Figura lives in the 900 block of Providence Avenue, just three homes away from one alternative route that includes North Laclede Station Road, and she sees no reason for any of the proposed plans.

“The traffic backs up twice a day during rush hour,” she said. “Every (traffic light) cycle will flush the traffic for an hour, so I don't believe that an hour in the morning and an hour in the evening is enough to warrant putting in an eight-lane road through our neighborhood.”

The need for a South County Connector is lost on Figura, who said she has lived close to North Laclede Station Road for six years and is used to the traffic.

“If you choose to live where you live, you have to take traffic into consideration,” she said. “I mean, we live in Webster Groves, we're central, and the people who live in South County, they should have known that when they moved there.”

Even though there is no firm plan and no federal, state or local money available to build any of the plans, Figura is not comfortable with potential buyouts.

“Once they come out with a decision our houses are marked,” she said. “It's going to effect our property values, what we can sell our homes for. But we're looking at all of our options right now because with two small children, we can't live off of a freeway.”

Webster Groves Mayor Gerry Welch urged residents to fill out the comment cards at the meeting and for other residents not at the meeting to make their opinions known to the county highway officials.

“What's here (on the map plans) as a possibility, is here,” Welch said. “What they have an opportunity to do, and they need to do, is participate in this project by providing their input. That's why we called this meeting and that's what we need. It's federal regulations (the EIS study) and it's a federal project and I'm almost begging our citizens to respond.”

Welch said she doesn't know if the new road alignments and improvements are needed but said there are alternatives that exist that do not go through residential neighborhoods.

“Our folks need to say that's a preferred route for them,” Welch said. “If they hear that from enough people it could become reality.”

Welch said her family home in Pennsylvania was taken by a highway project “and I really, really sympathize with these people, with all the uncertainty that is here. My heart is with them and they need to respond.”

Shrewsbury resident Shannon Haxel, of the 7400 block of Weil Avenue, asked county officials during the meeting how she could proceed with selling her home when the threat of road development hung over her head.

“We've had our home on the market for one month and we've had one showing,” Haxel said. “It's obviously a highly traveled road but its a great little neighborhood with starter homes which were selling before all of this. I don't know if we're going to be able to move from our starter home. We've been there for five years and our plan was to be there only five years and move, but if I were a potential buyer I wouldn't buy my home because you don't know if you're going to have a four lane highway in front of it.”

John Hicks, Transportation Development Specialist with the St. Louis County Department of Highways and Traffic, responded that they were still “early in the process” and that no concrete plans have been finalized yet.

For Haxel, that was not much reassurance.

“I grew up in Bridgeton, right by the airport, and when I was growing up they bought out a few neighborhoods and it's completely wiped out,” Haxel said. “My grandmother's house is destroyed and everything was bought out, and then they didn't even end up expanding the airport, so all of those families just got pitched out and half the community is gone.”

Haxel said traffic patterns could change again due to increased fuel costs and fewer drivers “and we have these great big highways and they're not even used.”

"Is it even worth all of this,” she asked. “I drive to work everyday in Clayton, so I stop at a bunch of stoplights and it takes me ten, 12 minutes to get to work. It's really not that bad.”

Hicks said the residents in the affected areas have no cause for alarm right now since no plan has been finalized and no funding “has been identified” for any project. In addition, the study must be completed and approved by all the agencies involved before any project could be eligible for federal and state funding. If that occurs, construction could begin anywhere in the next five to 10 years, according to a time line released by the county.

Following the meeting Hicks said that as the EIS process “moves forwards that (residents) will have those reassurances that they need.”

”We are required to look at multiple options and multiple impacts, including flood plain impacts,” Hicks said. “Now I'm not going to say one (plan) is better than the other but we have to identify those impacts.”

One EIS alternative plan shows a route from Laclede Station Road north of Deer Creek, along the Deer Creek Center in Maplewood; however, that plan would take the road through a flood plain. The area is close to the Tuxedo/Key West/Kuhlman area.

Other plans call for extensive use of Shrewsbury streets, including Shrewsbury, Landsdowne, Murdoch and Weil Avenues to connect to Watson Road or River Des Peres Avenue.

“When we do this detailed analysis we can come back to the public with hard numbers as to what the relative merits and disadvantages are of each of the alternatives,” Hicks said.

Resident can view the alternative plans and make comments here.