Tahoe transportation officials hope to drum up support for a project that could alleviate traffic woes at the state line. Reno Public Radio's Julia Ritchey reports.
Carl Hasty of the Tahoe Transportation District gave a bus tour last week to local media on a project that would reconfigure the main artery running through South Lake Tahoe.
Of the five proposals under consideration, Hasty is advocating for one that would realign four lanes of U.S. Highway 50 along Lake Parkway behind Harrah's and Montbleu casinos to the Village Shopping Center.
"One of the things we don't have up here at South Shore is a main street," he says. "It is dominated by the highway and dominated by cars."
He says rerouting traffic this way would allow them to turn the downtown into a more pedestrian and bike-friendly two-lane road.
"For folks in Reno who like to come up to the South Shore area, this is really about getting that main flow-thru traffic out through that core area," says Hasty.
The project would cost an estimated $75 million. An environmental impact report on all five plans will be released later this spring and final approval of one is expected by fall.
More on the project at tahoetransportation.org/us50.