NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WTVF) — Nashville officials announced more than $100 million in funding for transportation improvements as part of the Choose How You Move initiative, marking the first major investment from sales tax revenue collected over the past seven months.
The $104 million investment focuses on short-term, middle-term and long-term transportation projects across the city, according to Sabrina Sussman, who oversees the initiative.
"One of the things we're doing in this $104 million is really trying to focus our money in short-term, middle-term and long-term investments," Sussman said.
Detailed breakdown of transportation investments
The comprehensive investment package includes several major components:
- $31.4 million for 17 sidewalk projects
- $32.4 million for smart signals at 115 intersections
- $5 million for improvements in airport transit rider experience
- $18.6 million for key investments supporting WeGo service expansion
- $11.7 million for street re-designs to improve safety and make them easier to use regardless of travel method
- $1.6 million for safety improvements with WeGo and the new transit security division
The funding also advances planning and design work for improvements on key corridors including Nolensville Road and Gallatin Pike/Main Street.
Smart traffic lights coming to 115 intersections
The most noticeable change for drivers will be smart traffic lights replacing poorly timed signals at 115 intersections throughout Nashville.
So if you just change one intersection, the impact is not as significant as if you change a bunch of intersections in a row on a corridor. " said Sussman. "So there's some key corridors that we've identified and we can get you a map and sort of a list of those as well.
Mayor O'Connell said the goal is to help motorists move through intersections more efficiently.
"We had early estimates for the completion of the program that we would see," O'Connell said. "Every motorist passing through an updated intersection all of which connect to our traffic management center should experience more green lights overtime."
Airport access improvements included
The investment includes more than $5 million to improve access to the airport, breaking ground on new sidewalks and installing smart signals to keep all people moving. This represents early work on three key corridors that hundreds of thousands of Nashvillians use daily.
"This is the first time Nashville has ever done anything like this. We will be coming back and making another announcement sometime next year about the next big chunk," Sussman said.
Construction on the traffic lights and sidewalks is expected to begin within the next few months, according to Sussman.
Want to see how these transportation improvements will affect your daily commute? Watch our full video report and share your thoughts on Nashville's biggest transportation investment. Have questions about projects in your neighborhood? Contact reporter Kim Rafferty at kim.rafferty@NewsChannel5.com
In this article, we used artificial intelligence to help us convert a video news report originally written by Kim Rafferty. When using this tool, both Kim and the NewsChannel 5 editorial team verified all the facts in the article to make sure it is fair and accurate before we published it. We care about your trust in us and where you get your news, and using this tool allows us to convert our news coverage into different formats so we can quickly reach you where you like to consume information. It also lets our journalists spend more time looking into your story ideas, listening to you and digging into the stories that matter.
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