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Regional planning commissions press for flood-resilient roads, say towns need more grant support
Summary
Regional planning commissions told the House Transportation Committee on Feb. 11 that rural road networks and flood-resiliency projects require continued technical assistance and easier access to grant funds; presenters highlighted a long hydraulic model and successful pilot projects but warned of municipal capacity limits.
House Transportation Committee — Regional planning commissioners told lawmakers on Feb. 11 that flood-resilient road design, coordinated grant planning and sustained technical assistance are essential for small towns recovering from repeated floods and for managing visitor-driven congestion in mountain corridors.
"We have just over 900 total road miles in [the region]," Alec Jones, transportation planner at the Memorial County Planning Commission, told the committee, adding that roughly 15% are state highways, another 15% are paved town roads and the rest are gravel. He said most towns have very small road crews and that steep slopes and flood plains affect nearly all local roads.
Why it matters: Presenters said repeated floods in 2023 and 2024 exposed vulnerabilities across rural networks and accelerated regional efforts to pair transportation planning with hydraulic and floodplain modeling. Seth Jensen, deputy director of the Memorial County…
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