CHAMBER COMPILES STREET PRIORITIES

Projects in all areas of the city are included on a priority list of capital street improvements compiled by a subcommittee of the Cape Girardeau Chamber of Commerce's Surface Transportation Committee.

The list, which includes proposed road work along sections of Bloomfield Road, Perryville Road, Hopper Road, Mt. Auburn Road, New Madrid Street, Rodney Street, West End Boulevard, Southern Expressway and Lexington Avenue, now will be submitted to the chamber board for further discussion.

The subcommittee's "Top 10" priority list, which also includes reconstruction of older streets in Wards 1 and 2, was compiled in response to the city council's request for input.

"The city is seeking recommendations from some organizations and the surface transportation committee is one of those groups," said John Mehner, president of the Chamber of Commerce. The board will discuss the committee's list when it meets May 2, he added.

The final list will be submitted to the city after the board meeting.

"We're expecting priority lists from the chamber's Surface Transportation Committee and the city's Planning and Zoning Commission," said Cape Girardeau City Manager J. Ronald Fischer.

Fischer added that information also is being compiled from public hearings being conducted by Vision 2000. The organization is sponsoring a dozen public meetings at various sites through May 13, and a town hall meeting May 22 at West Park Mall.

All the information from the chamber committee, P&Z, and the Vision 2000 hearings could lead to a recommendation to place a transportation tax measure on the ballot, said Fischer.

"What comes out of these meetings will determine any action taken by the council," said Fischer.

The council has discussed placing a half-cent sales tax on the ballot to generate funds for transportation projects in the city.

Thirty-one transportation projects are on the unfunded needs list, and 23 others currently are planned for fiscal years 1998 through 2000. Most of the projects are included in the city's five-year capital improvements plan or the unfunded needs list.

In the current five-year plan, only projects in fiscal years 1996 and 1997 have solid funding sources.

Those projects include reconstruction of Perryville Road from Meyer Drive north to the city limits, widening and reconstruction of a portion of Broadway, the extension of Hopper Road from Mount Auburn to Kage, and a number of airport improvements.

The unfunded list includes construction and reconstruction of sidewalks throughout the city and the widening of William Street from Sprigg to Main.

Also on the list is construction of Vantage Drive, a planned outer beltway east of Interstate 55 that would extend from Hopper Road to the Cape Girardeau exit at Highway 61 and then north to Route W.

Cape Girardeau voters twice have defeated transportation tax measures, once in 1986 and again in 1987.