Secretary: DOT Won’t Scale Back Milwaukee Interstate Project

Wisconsin Transportation Secretary Mark Gottlieb said there are no plans to shrink a planned major freeway project in Milwaukee that encompasses a few miles of Interstate 94, between the Marquette and Zoo interchanges.

Environmental groups and some Democratic state lawmakers again last week urged the state Department of Transportation to go with just safety improvements on the planned I-94 East-West rebuild. The coalition said the state could save hundreds of millions of dollars over the DOT’s preferred option that would include widening but not near cemeteries.

But Gottlieb said the preferred option remains the plan as it’s a response to community input.

“You know, people didn’t want the double-decker freeway, they didn’t want the most costly option,” he said. “They didn’t want to disturb the cemeteries. You know, we met all those goals.”

Gottlieb said an environmental impact statement for the east-west 94 project will be released by spring.