Fort Worth resident Victor Sakya sees accidents almost daily while driving along Boat Club Road. In the two years since he moved to Far North Fort Worth, the road has become synonymous with dangerous speeding.
“I’ve never seen a day where there’s no traffic on Boat Club Road,” Sakya said. “It’s very dangerous. The road I don’t think can handle the number of people driving on it.”
Relief could be coming soon for residents in fast-growing parts of Tarrant County, thanks to funding from a $400 million 2021 transportation bond.
During its Sept. 5 meeting, the Tarrant County Commissioners Court allocated $103.5 million out of the $125 million set aside for countywide projects in the bond. Seven new projects are slated to help improve roads across the county. The projects range from improving and widening streets to constructing new ones.
These significant investments in infrastructure took time to plan because the roadwork projects span multiple cities, said Randy Skinner, transportation services director for the county.
The goal is to get ahead of the projected growth in those parts of Tarrant County.
The largest chunk of county money will go toward Precinct 4 in northwest Tarrant County, followed by Precinct 3 in northeast Tarrant County and Precinct 1 in southwest Tarrant County.
The largest county allocation will be for the reconstruction and widening of Bonds Ranch Road from Boat Club Road to Wagley Robertson Road. Some of the funds will assist with the construction of a railroad-grade separation.
“Each end of Bonds Ranch Road has kind of its own problems,” said resident Daniel Queen, who has lived off that road since 2015. “ The east end is very flat. The west end has the blind hills. On the west end, too, we have that new high school construction. So, there’s always rocks and dirt debris from that. There’s contractors walking into the road and people stopping to pull in. The rock trucks have been very, very bad. Those guys are either going five miles an hour, blocking traffic, or they’re doing 80 miles an hour about to run you down.”
Commissioner Manny Ramirez, who oversees Precinct 4, said these intercity projects provide much-needed east-to-west and north-to-south connectivity.
“We’re trying to catch up with all the growth that has come over the last decade. But more than that, we’re trying to get ahead of the growth that’s coming in the next 50 years,” Ramirez said.
Other projects include the reconstruction of Boat Club Road and the widening of Wichita Street in Forest Hill and Farm Road 2871 in Benbrook and Southwest Fort Worth.
The county already has allocated much of the $200 million from the 2021 bond funds set aside for municipal projects. Most of those city projects are under agreements and could see dirt moving soon, Skinner said.
Commissioners have expressed a desire to see projects completed or underway within five years, since the bond was approved by voters in November 2021.
For Ramirez, that goal is not too lofty.
“Some (projects) are going to be easier than others, depending on other funding sources,” he said. “The longer you wait to allocate these dollars and actually start construction, the more expensive it gets. So, we’re really focused on leveraging the Tarrant County taxpayers’ dollars to get them the best product at the lowest cost and make sure that we maintain a capacity to do it in the future.”
Sandra Sadek is a Report for America corps member, covering growth for the Fort Worth Report. You can contact her at sandra.sadek@fortworthreport.org or on Twitter at @ssadek19.
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