Letter: Show us your work
At the recent Dubois County Commissioners meeting reported on in the Dubois County Free Press, Commissioner Chad Blessinger presented some of the responses received to specific questions posed to INDOT about the Mid-States Corridor project. First, I would like to thank Commissioner Blessinger for caring enough about the citizens of Dubois County to try to get more information about the project. I wish we would see the other elective officials in the county be as proactive in finding out exactly how the project will affect the county as he has.
One section of the report should be of particular interest to the residents of the county.
When Blessinger questioned the benefits specifically for Dubois County residents, Wheeler cited travel time savings as the primary advantage. The project would generate “over 300,000 hours of travel time savings annually within the 12-county study area, which is 600 hours per day of travel savings” for commuters, plus additional truck hour savings.
However, Blessinger remained skeptical about local benefits. “I can see how Mid-States Corridor improves transportation for the state. I struggle to see how it is beneficial for the average Dubois County citizen,” Blessinger stated.
Addressing concerns about increased commute times for local residents who must use J-turns to cross the new corridor, Wheeler said the additional time has been factored into their calculations. Despite individual commutes potentially adding a minute and a half each way, the overall model still shows net travel-time savings, according to INDOT.
We are expected to believe that local residents will be saving 600 hours per day in travel time by having almost every east-west road either be dead-ended or having a J-turn that takes 1 ½ minute to navigate with light traffic. Imagine what it’s going to be like on the Celestine highway in the morning when everyone is trying to get to work, waiting for their opportunity to pull onto a busy highway, immediately cross the fast lane, make a U-turn, pull out of the U-turn into the fast lane and cross the travel lane to reach the exit. The delays will probably be much longer.
INDOT’s response is “the overall model still shows net time-travel savings.” The commissioners should not be satisfied with that response. Their response should be the same as what I would like to see: Show us the data.
Remember, there is no road on which they can measure actual travel times. They are using modeling to predict time savings. The thing with models is that they can be manipulated easily to achieve a desired outcome. A slight change in the input can be magnified greatly in the results. When I was in college, there was a nickname for modeling – SWAG (Scientific wild-ass guess). Unless INDOT is willing to make public all modeling done in their studies, including their methods of determining the input, we, as citizens, have a legitimate right to question where the numbers came from.
The response that it is taken into account in the modeling is the equivalent of Ronald Reagan’s famous quote regarding the bureaucracy in Washington, D.C.: “Trust us, we’re from the government.”
The reports released so far by the Lochmueller Group contain many benefit claims that appear to be manipulated to improve the outcome for the report. If we don’t know how these numbers were calculated, why should we believe them?
This project is too important for the future of Dubois County to accept that this is the best thing for us based on reports created with smoke and mirrors. We deserve to have all the data, projections, and estimates clearly shown so that we can see that they are accurate. As my math teacher used to say, “Show us your work”.
If this project is truly what is best for Dubois County, INDOT and the Lochmueller Group should be willing to explain exactly how they arrived at the numbers. Until they do so, it will continue to appear that this is a pet project of the Governor and a few of his big business cronies for their benefit at the expense of the rest of us.
Tom Bartelt
Huntingburg
