La Entrada segment will connect SH 349, FM 1788

The Federal Highway Administration has issued environmental approval for the Texas Department of Transportation [TxDOT] to proceed with an $18 million project to build a new highway connecting State Highway 349, five miles north of Loop 250, to Farm to Market Road 1788 to route commercial traffic around northwest Midland, according to a TxDOT official in Odessa.

Federal officials have determined that the project will not have any significant impact on the human or natural environment, based on a detailed environmental assessment. The final public hearing document, which includes TxDOT responses to comments by the public, is available for review at the Midland Area and Odessa District offices.

"The new highway will be built through pasture land in Midland and Martin counties," said Ajay Shakyaver, TxDOT's project manager. "The route extends from the State Highway 191 and FM 1788 interchange and runs northeasterly for about 16 miles."

The highway will connect to the existing SH 349 and will ultimately consist of a four-lane rural freeway [two lanes in each direction] within a 300-foot right-of-way with interchanges located at a realigned FM 17888/County Road 60 intersection; at SH 158; at the future Holiday Hill and Garfield Road intersections, and at the northern connect to existing SH 349.

"The highway will be built in stages," said Shakyaver. "Construction of the first phase could start as early as August 2006, once all the property has been acquired and utilities and pipelines have been moved."

"The first phase includes construction of one-half [southbound lanes] of the ultimate four-lane divided freeway and an interchange with SH 349 in Martin County," he explained. "Other improvements, such as additional interchanges at SH 158 and FM 1788 will be built as the need arises."

An additional 100-foot right-of-way is also proposed on each side of the freeway to accommodate the construction of a two-lane, undivided local collector road network. This network will be located on both sides of the proposed freeway to provide local access to properties adjacent to the freeway and restore the local traffic circulation.

"The new highway calls for the acquisition of about 1,200 acres of new right-of-way and the next step in the project will include purchase of this property from the landowners," said Shakyaver. "TxDOT is waiting for the go-ahead from the agency's right-of-way office to begin negotiating these purchases.

"There will be no displacement of any landowners," he said.

The reliever route is the first segment in Texas to be built for the La Entrada al Pacifico, a north-south trade route from the Pacific Ocean in the western Mexico state of Sinaloa through the state of Chihuahua into West Texas, according to Shakyaver. The La Entrada route in the U.S. extends from Lamesa to Presidio.

The highway project, approved by the Texas Transportation Commission in November 1999, is designed to lessen future truck traffic congestion on Loop 250 in Midland. Bills have been introduced in Congress by U.S. Senator John Cornyn [Texas] and U.S. Representative Randy Neugebauer [Lubbock] to designate the La Entrada al Pacifico as a "U.S. High Priority" corridor.

Shakyaver noted that Chihuahua has already built a new 35-mile section between Mexico's Federal Highway 16 and Chihuahua's State Highway 67 as the first segment of the corridor. The new roadway connects the two highways and circumvents a mountainous stretch of Mexican 16 south of Ojinaga.

In 1995, at the urging of the Midland-Odessa Transportation Alliance [MOTRAN] and other local representatives, the Texas Transportation Commission endorsed the concept of the La Entrada corridor. And in 1997, the Texas Legislature officially designated the section of highway between Lamesa and Presidio.