Businessmen concerned about project

TxDOT proposing improvements to FM 521, FM 2234 to ease congestion

The Texas Department of Transportation held what is likely its last public meeting on a $30.5 million project designed to ease congestion on FM 2234 and FM 521.

Bill Brudnick, TxDOT’s director of transportation planning and development for the Houston District Office, spoke with a group of about 25 area residents, some of them with businesses in the affected area.

“The purpose of this hearing is to discuss the improvements, and potential impacts those improvements would have on the Almeda Road Nature Preserve property,” Brudnick said.

The project is one of four funded with the passage of Proposition 1 in November, which infused an estimated $1.7 billion in revenue to the state highway fund, without raising taxes, creating toll roads or adding fees.

The project, which is scheduled to begin in January 2016, will take three years to complete and calls for the reconstruction and widening of FM 521 from two to four lanes from Beltway 8, to 0.3 miles south of FM 2234 and the adjacent Union Pacific Rail Road Crossing between Fort Bend and Harris counties.

Improvements are also planned to take place on FM 2234 and include widening from two to four lanes, starting 0.3 miles west of FM 521, to 0.2 miles east of FM 521.

The improvements, other than widening, will also include adding curbs and sidewalks, and will require the acquisition of 1.67 acres of 45.75 acres of the Almeda Road Nature Preserve which falls within the proposed right-of-way to meet TxDOT design standards.

While the projects are designed to improve mobility, some businesspeople are more concerned with the impact they will have on their livelihood.

Robert Bockel, who owns and operates a vehicle inspection station on FM 521, said the changes will impact his business by altering the traffic patterns coming from the west.

“They are going to do what they are going to do, and there isn’t a hell of a lot we will be able to do about it,” a frustrated Bockel said. “You come to these meetings, and this person sends you somewhere else, to talk to talk to someone else. That’s been the whole deal.”

The property where the Bockel business stands has been in his family for nearly 70 years, and has not been part of any discussion as far as purchase for fair market value by the state.

“They have not offered to buy me out,” he said. “They hold all these meetings to (apparently) let everybody know, but they don’t tell anybody anything.”

Firdous Hamani, who has owned and operated an Exxon station at the intersection of FM 521 and FM 2234 since 1997, came to the meeting with a folder full of documents that included emails from him pleading with the state for answers.

Hamani said the changes will affect the traffic on FM 2234, which will only allow customers to access his business from one direction instead of two, as it has in the past.

“The four-way light that is there (intersection of FM 521 and FM 2234) is going away,” he said. “It’s going to be 55 (miles per hour) through there. Who’s going to stop and make a left turn? This part of my business will become a grave yard. I do over 100,000 gallons (of fuel) per month, and now I’m going to do 30,000.”

Like Bockel, Hamani said he has often been put off, or directed elsewhere by TxDOT officials, but has never received any answers to his inquiries.

“They are not telling me anything. Nothing,” he said. “I was waiting for a response from the last meeting, when I was told of this meeting.”

Deidrea George, public information officer, TxDOT, said in an email, “I also spoke with our Right of Way supervisor regarding if there was some type of compensation for businesses that are adversely affected by upcoming projects. She said there are ways that TxDOT will compensate a business but there are ways that TxDOT will not compensate a business and without having more detailed information it would be difficult to give an accurate answer.”

The final environmental assessment and environmental decision on the project are expected to be rendered later this summer.

The project plans can be viewed online at http:// preview.txdot.gov/insidetxdot/projects/studies/houston/fm521.html