It's apparently official.

[Erstwhile]

It hit the news today.  The first Buc-ee's in AR has been approved to be constructed at our infamous I-30 Exit 114.  I guess that means we won't be able to enter/exit for several more years.  The Highway Department will probably have to widen our stretch of I-30 another coupla lanes soon after they ever get the current widening finished.  Dad bought 40 or so head of young breed stock off of that place when he was setting up back in the 60's.  There wasn't even an I-30 there back then.

(An aside- rumor has it that the current I-30 widening contractor is having to pay a delay penalty of $76 thou a day for running over the time requirement.  It is a historic nasty river crossing.)

[504]

Penalty money seems to go away when you can blame high water,low water,too hot, or cold. And a couple of envelopes full of cash left of a desk or two.

[Erstwhile]

I kinda thought the same thing about the penalty.

[olfolks]

The pertly is the smoke and mirror set up to make the tax payer fell like the state is doing a good job with their money , if the contractor pays it is just a way to hide everyone’s cut

[billinohio]

You have really arrived!
It is really hard to believe how much traffic a Bucees will generate, considering that it is not a “truck” stop. They will have dozens of fuel pumps with cars lined up behind each of them..
It’s also hard to believe that anybody builds a gas station when we are all gonna have electric cars.
there is one coming in north of Dayton, Ohio, too.

[Erstwhile]

I may have spoken too soon. It appears there are couple items that need to be worked out.  One was a sign restriction that needed to be granted an allowance, and such.  Couple more palms crossed will probably fix that.

AR's highway department has been rotten forever.  It got so bad that the Legislature finally had to do do something a few years ago.  (Pot calling kettle black kinda thing.). So the pols decided to set the Highway department up as an independent agency outside of Legislative or Governor control.  😳😳  Yep, that fixed it right up.  Sure did.

[donjr]

Maybe they'll incorporate one when they rebuilt the Key Bridge....?

[diydave]

Apr 3, 2024 12:10:47 GMT -6 donjr said:

Maybe they'll incorporate one when they rebuilt the Key Bridge....?

My guess is that they will get halfway through buildin the new bridge, stop, when it goes nowhere, and name it the joseph robinette biden Jr, memorial bridge...

[Butcher]

Apr 3, 2024 9:36:55 GMT -6 Erstwhile said:

I may have spoken too soon. It appears there are couple items that need to be worked out.  One was a sign restriction that needed to be granted an allowance, and such.  Couple more palms crossed will probably fix that.

AR's highway department has been rotten forever.  It got so bad that the Legislature finally had to do do something a few years ago.  (Pot calling kettle black kinda thing.). So the pols decided to set the Highway department up as an independent agency outside of Legislative or Governor control.  😳😳  Yep, that fixed it right up.  Sure did.

That right there sounds like a good ider to me. Not.Kinda reminds me of a story from years back having to do with a co worker and his checking account. He was bitchin 1 day about always getting over draft charges. I says, dont you balnce yer check book? Yes he says every month. So I asked whats the problem you cant add and subtract? F- you he says I can add and subtract just fine but its the checks my wife writes that are causing me grief. As much as I really didnt give a shit about him or his wife or his personal problems I still had to poke the bear and asked him why his wifes writing checks was the problem. Well he says I got my check book and she has hers. Turns out they were both writing checks off the same account but not getting together with thier bookeeping.

[billinohio]

Morons!
Unfortunately, there are lots of them.

[bgoathill]

We've had jobs with multi-thousand dollar per day penalties. It's mainly to keep the less than desirable contractors from bidding on jobs. If you make a concerted effort to complete on time they'll usually give you some leeway if you go over a bit. Within reason.

[504]

We were half way through a paving job and paved up to a bridge and the boss said go home i'll see you in the spring. The last day IA would let us pave was Nov 15th, which was on Monday,we left on Friday,and on penalty all winter(no it wasn't)