… but they have a big say in how a large chunk of your tax dollars are spent right here in the county. Specifically, the federal tax dollars that allow our communities to make much-needed transportation improvements they couldn’t fund on their own.
Federal law requires every “urbanized area” with a population of more than 50,000 to have what’s known as a metropolitan planning organization, or MPO. Most of the eastern half of Hendricks County falls into the Indianapolis MPO, which operates as the Indy MPO. It covers the city and most of the built-up parts of the surrounding counties. There are 14 MPOs in the state.
In simple terms, an MPO determines which projects in its area will receive federal funding. Say Avon wanted to build a giant roundabout at U.S. 36 and Ronald Reagan Parkway, Zionsville was planning a second level in the village, Fishers wanted a dedicated exit to keep Ikea traffic off its streets, and Greenwood wanted three pedestrian bridges for its Riverfront District. (And yes, Greenwood has a riverfront district centered on a small creek. I’m not making that one up.) Unfortunately, central Indiana is receiving enough federal funds to cover the cost of just one of those projects. The MPO decides which of them gets funded.
In a broader scope, the agency oversees transportation planning for central Indiana. Its operations are managed by a board of directors representing the counties and communities within its boundaries. The MPO works to prioritize and coordinate the transportation planning of each county and community, so they won’t make incompatible changes. It’s responsible for planning and programming federal dollars for highways, transit, trails, and other ways people and goods move through the area.
One of the most important roles an MPO plays is creating a regional transportation plan that studies its region’s needs for the next two decades and the best ways to accomplish it. Sophisticated mathematical models generate the potential effects of different ideas. For example, when the state first considered adding additional lanes to US 36, the MPO’s models provided insight into how those lanes would affect traffic on other roads. Factors like truck traffic and pedestrian safety are also studied.
While it might seem that all the road construction projects Hendricks County residents contend with every summer are random and not well-coordinated, that really isn’t accurate. Most of the delays and hiccups with local projects are due to issues outside the MPO’s control – one of the biggest being utility company delays in moving infrastructure like fiber optic data lines so construction can proceed.
It isn’t easy to spread a limited amount of federal funding across the long list of projects communities want to begin. Every county and community thinks its projects should get first priority, but that obviously can’t be the case. If you’ve ever wondered why it’s taking so long for a local town to build a roundabout or get a new Interstate exit, it’s not because your local officials are incompetent or lack foresight. They’re just waiting for their much-needed project to work its way up the MPO’s list.