Residents of northern Jefferson County gave their 2 cents on the upcoming construction of an access road that will connect Interstate 530 to the future GTL Americas facility, during a public involvement meeting Tuesday at the White Hall Community Center.
A preliminary map of the two-way road shows the beginning of construction from Stagecoach Road, which is off Exit 24, heading southward along I-530 and turning east past Amerson Drive, where a bridge will go over Arkansas 365 to GTL Americas, near the National Center for Toxicological Research. GTL, an acronym for gas-to-liquid, is in the early stages of an engineering phase that could go into 2025 with plans for commercial operations to begin by 2029.
Instead of a classroom-type setting, visitors went from one station to another examining maps and talking with representatives from the Arkansas Department of Transportation.
“This is more of an informal, informational format, more conversational,” said Ellen Coulter, media communications manager for ArDOT. “… It’s less formal than a sit-down presentation.”
Public input is the first step of the planning process for ArDOT’s road project, Coulter said. The project is in what Coulter called an environmental phase, in which engineers will devise plans for where exactly the road will be and what environmental steps go into it.
Independent reporting for Pine Bluff & Jefferson County since 1879.
“Once the environmental portion is approved, it will go into approving the actual right of way for the actual road,” Coulter said.
The mood toward the road project has been largely positive, Coulter said, and leaders of Jefferson County’s municipalities along with County Judge Gerald Robinson anticipate an upward economic impact from GTL Americas’ arrival, but not everyone is in love with the construction to come to their residential areas.
“My house is across the road from where the spur is going to come out,” Wilson Ryals said. “The traffic is going to be crazy, and there are probably going to be these nuts tearing up everything. … A lot of people think there’s a better place to come across the highway, a little more south toward Pine Bluff, maybe just a mile down there.
“Am I happy they’re going to be doing construction right outside my house? No.”
Ryals and opponents surmised their voices don’t matter.
“Where we are, we’ve been there 40 years,” said Wrenetta Hill, who attended with her husband, Jerry. “It’s a quiet place. [Ryals’] road is at the end, and we don’t want to disturb that. We’re not going to live that much longer anyway. No, we’re against it, 100 percent.
“You’re going to be disrupting a lot of people’s lives who’ve been out there. It’s not right.”
ArDOT officials are required to read over all submitted comments, which will ultimately have an impact on how the road is constructed, Coulter said. Public comment will be accepted through the end of December at ardot.gov/publicmeetings.
Other visitors offered helpful tidbits to engineers on the affected land, according to Allison Thompson, president and CEO of the Economic Development Alliance and Chamber for Jefferson County.
“The comments people were making were helpful as they were going through this design,” Thompson said. “I didn’t hear anybody upset, like ‘This is going to make me unhappy.’ Some of the comments I heard were like, ‘I know a spring that floods here and floods there.’ I think they were just being helpful.”
Redfield Mayor Roben Brooks said the addition of the road to GTL Americas will be a plus for Jefferson County.
“It certainly is for Redfield because we’re not but 5 miles, maybe, from where the pathway will be. We’re looking forward to the tax increase and the revenue, that’s the big thing,” Brooks said.
Brooks recalled when Brown & Root Industrial Services built the White Bluff Entergy plant, which led to an influx of construction workers and their families in Redfield and the White Hall School District.
“We’ve got to get ready for it because this is a huge, long-term project,” Brooks said.