I am writing today to announce the closure of the Michigan Messenger. After four years of operation in Michigan, the board of the American Independent News Network, has decided to shift publication of its news into a single site, The American Independent at Americanindependent.com. This is part of a shift in strategy, towards new forms [...]
An abstinence-only presentation provided to numerous school districts in Calhoun and Eaton Counties in October of this year provided false and misleading information to students about HIV, experts allege.
Two county registers of deeds filed a class action lawsuit Monday on behalf of Michigan’s 83 counties alleging that the Mortgage Electronic Registration Services owes millions of dollars in property title transfer taxes.
Despite evidence of the impact of mercury on children and public health, Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette last month joined with 24 other state attorneys general in filing a lawsuit to scuttle new EPA regulations that would reduce mercury emissions from power plants.
Backers of a new, publicly-owned bridge connecting Detroit to Windsor, Canada, received good news yesterday as the Michigan Department of Transportation’s new “investment-grade” study reaffirmed the need for a second bridge spanning the border.
The study, conducted by Wilbur Smith Associates, projects traffic volumes through the next quarter century, and concludes that even despite the current economic downturn, a second bridge is critical to accommodating the region’s future trade.
By 2035, the study projects average weekday traffic on the new Detroit River International Crossing bridge to be 34,600 vehicles. That projection is down nearly 10 percent from what was concluded in the 2008 DRIC Final Environmental Impact Statement. But according to MDOT, that’s still more than enough to justify investment in the new bridge.
The DRIC project would also be expected to boost the local economy in the short term with a massive infusion of construction-related jobs. MDOT issued a statement accompanying the release of the 230-page study hyping the opportunity the DRIC project represents. From that statement:
“We welcome the opportunity to have the traffic projections that were used for the FEIS reaffirmed by a new investment-grade traffic study. This new study not only confirms the importance of the existing international crossing but also reaffirms the need for a new crossing in the Detroit-Windsor corridor within the next five to 10 years in order to support trade between the United States and Canada,” said State Transportation Director Kirk T. Steudle. “Now is the time to begin a project that will put 10,000 Michigan citizens to work and add more than 30,000 associated jobs during construction, while retaining another 25,000 jobs in our state for the long-term.”
The study is one of the last remaining pieces of information required by the Michigan legislature by May 1 before lawmakers decide whether or not to support DRIC.
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