Task force tackles job of re-creating transport agency.

A newly created Arkansas Department of Transportation would be responsible for more than roads if a legislative task force has a say.

Lawmakers on the Intermodal Transportation and Commerce Task Force discussed Wednesday reorganizing the state Highway and Transportation Department to include the Arkansas Waterways Commission and the Arkansas Department of Aeronautics.

The task force exists to consider creating an Arkansas Department of Transportation, study intermodal transportation and look into related economic development opportunities, according to Act 166 of 2015.

The bill passed in the Senate 30-0 and the House 96-1 during the regular session of 2015.

Creating such a Department of Transportation would be a “monster,” said the task force chairman, Sen. Eddie Joe Williams, R-Cabot.

“We’ll debate that. We’ll have a spirited debate,” he said. “Hopefully the product we’ll have will be a better product than we have today.”

Rep. Mathew W. Pitsch, R-Fort Smith, who was the primary author of the bill to create the task force, said transportation companies are increasingly shipping the same containers on water, highway and rail and need one department to answer to.

“We wrote the bill in tandem with all of these department heads. We see the industry going toward multimodes of freight, but we are still structured … with multiple departments,” he said in an interview.

“We started looking around, and the industry has gone into multimode, other states are going to multimode in the way they’re structured. You see [Departments of Transportation] all over the country.”

Representatives from railroads, trucking companies, the Highway Department, the Arkansas Economic Development Commission and others are on the task force.

“Our actual hauling on the interstate is getting shorter due to the hours-of-service rules, passing of electronic logs … a shortage of drivers,” said Butch Rice, chief executive at Stallion Transportation Group in Beebe.

“Thirty years ago, if I was sitting here, I would tell you we don’t care about railroads. Our history is the highways. That’s where we make our money. But over the past 30 years, more and more trucking companies have gotten involved in rail.”

Williams said the state has the opportunity to help expand intermodal facilities, bringing transportation industry jobs to the state.

Outside of rail, the task force could consider pipelines as a form of transportation under a new Arkansas Department of Transportation, said John Lipton, who served a 10-year term on the Arkansas Highway Commission and was a former Arkansas house speaker.

Rep. Mike Holcomb, D-Pine Bluff, said the task force should consider levee boards’ involvement in transportation.

Pitsch said the point of the commission is to consider any changes that would help the state use its “limited, precious” transportation dollars more efficiently.

Planning highways and train tracks with complementary uses for transportation companies might be one way to do that, he said.