> No state DOT is turning down a lane widening project, or a new highway build, or a "smart lane" because their jobs depend on it, even if it comes at the expense of us all. They really are not departments of transportation but just departments of highways and cars.
My city in Kentucky at least has been making all sorts of headway on multiple major "road diet" projects. Many of those projects are probably more expensive in the short term and maybe even in the long term, so it seems good for business too.
These "Road Diets" are amazing: fewer lanes, dedicated turn lanes, dedicated curb space for parking (and plants!). Traffic is safer, oddly slower but ultimately faster (median speeds are down but throughput is higher and accidents generally fewer; all commute times are better than the multi-lane equivalent times despite cars moving individually slower on average; fewer stops and grid blocks).
To maintain fewer lanes at faster throughput, they seem to need a lot more concrete and lot more road painting and that keeps jobs employed.
I don't know how you sell Columbus on the idea, I barely know how we sold ourselves on the idea, and I do know how much controversy it has been for some of the earliest streets to get put on such a "road diet". (Businesses looking at the plans complained that they'd lose a lot of car traffic and thus a lot of business. Results were mostly the opposite: slower median speeds meant more awareness of local businesses people were passing by. More dedicated street parking meant more people actually stopping at businesses. Slower median speeds, with sidewalks more protected by street parking and other furniture, also meant more pedestrian foot traffic, because they felt safer, something once long thought vanished never to return for some of these streets.)