Widening Interstate 65 from the Tennessee state line to Mobile is a priority for Alabama Lt. Gov. Will Ainsworth, and is rising to become a top concern among some of his Republican colleagues in the State House.

Widening U.S. 43 remains a focus of Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey’s administration. It is also embraced by local officials who view it as a crucial project through a mostly rural region in West Alabama.

The two projects call for additional lanes and come with gigantic price tags.

They are also two colossal road projects that could be headed to a clash of regional disputes and changing political winds.

Ainsworth is angling to run for governor in 2026, and the I-65 widening project could be a top policy platform.

Ivey, who prioritize U.S. 43′s widening in her 2021 State of the State address, is term limited. But she’s committed to the project, as are mayors and state lawmakers in West Alabama.

“We need a direct highway and connection out of Mobile to tie into Tuscaloosa and west Alabama,” said state Rep. Curtis Travis, D-Tuscaloosa. “It’s very important.”

He added, “It gets into politics, but when you look at I-65, it’s a federal highway. I’m sure (state officials) can work with the Federal Highway Administration to secure the federal dollars to expand and make (I-65) six lanes all the way through.”

Alabama State Senator Chris Elliott, R-Daphne, who praises Ainsworth’s embrace of the I-65 project, said widening the interstate should be a higher priority than spending money on U.S. 43, noting the difference in traffic counts.

I-65 draws more than 130,000 vehicles per day – and that’s just in Birmingham. U.S. 43, at its peak traffic count in Tuscaloosa, draws 33,848 vehicles per day.

“It’s not where the people are,” said state Senator Chris Elliott, R-Daphne, who repeatedly pushes for state lawmakers to provide enough funding where the state’s growth and tourism is going – which is mainly within Baldwin County.

“It’s not where the traffic is,” Elliott said about U.S. 43. “It makes no sense to put that (attention and funding) there when you have other needs around the state.”

‘Leadership’

The Alabama State Senate recently approved a resolution that urged the Alabama Department of Transportation to study and prioritize improvements and additional capacity along I-65. The eventual goal, the resolution states, is to have the appropriate number of lanes in each direction of all sections of the interstate.

Ainsworth, for years, has advocated for improving I-65. He is now pushing to have the entire interstate six-laned for 366 miles from the Tennessee-Alabama state line south to Mobile.

“It looks like leadership to me,” Elliott said of Ainsworth handling of the massive project that Ivey criticized as something that “makes headlines.”

“It’s about laying a bold vision for Alabama and a bold, conservative vision for Alabama, and he is ready to lead, clearly,” said Elliott, who is supportive of Ainsworth likely run for governor in three years.

But in West Alabama, where the U.S. 43 project has been planned and discussed for decades, talks about pitting one large project against another is creating concern.

“As a city among many small towns in rural West Alabama, we support everyone’s desire to have better transportation infrastructure including the I-65 lane expansion project,” said Thomasville Mayor Sheldon Day.

“It is really disappointing to me when anyone makes statements that appear to pit one group or region of Alabama against the other,” Day said. “Rural areas have always received the short end of the distribution of transportation dollars. Even though we may not be in the majority, our last name is still Alabama just like Huntsville, Birmingham, Mobile, etc.”

The U.S. 43 lane widening project is slated to include Thomasville and traverse north into Marengo and Greene counties before finishing in Tuscaloosa, a distance of about 100 miles.

Thought Ivey initially called the project a “widening” of U.S. 43, ALDOT has since referred to it as the creation of a new north-south “corridor.” It will also be the only north-south four-lane highway through Alabama west of I-65.

Day said that every major candidate for Alabama governor since the late 1950s has touted rural West Alabama and committed to building a new West Alabama corridor.

He said constructing the corridor has been on the state’s five-year transportation plan for at least 30 years.

Day said, “Only one governor has been bold enough to keep that promise … Governor Kay Ivey.”

‘Benefits’

U.S. 43, as proposed, will include new corridors through communities in Alabama’s Black Belt region that has been besieged with declining populations.

Tuscaloosa Mayor Walt Maddox, who ran against Ivey during the 2018 governor’s election, said the federal bipartisan infrastructure program and revenues generated from the state’s 10-cent-per-gallon fuel tax increase in 2019, should allow state leaders to “think and act strategically in all corners of the state.”

Maddox said he has a “great working relationship” with Ainsworth and is confident in his leadership.

“Like him, I too have been stuck in the I-65 traffic, especially south of Hoover and agree it must be addressed,” he said. “Senator Elliott is advocating for his constituency, and he should.”

Maddox said the U.S. 43 project, once completed, will provide for a four-lane corridor that links Mobile beyond Tuscaloosa toward Muscle Shoals, and will “have a significant transportation and economic impact for our region and state, including Mercedes-Benz located in Tuscaloosa.”

“Governor Ivey took the lead on starting the first phase from Thomasville to Tuscaloosa, and we are grateful for her bold and strategic action,” Maddox said.

Day said Thomasville is already seeing benefits from the start of construction of the U.S. 43 project. He said there has been an uptick of “industrial and commercial projects looking at our area,” and he anticipates the highway providing a “level playing field for us.”

“It will, at the very least, give us a chance to compete for those projects that have been out of our reach for generations,” said Day. “We’ve been successful in Thomasville in landing some great projects over the last 20 years. However, I have personally witnessed our region lose many projects because of a lack of a four-lane highway option to our north.”

As for I-65, Day said it’s “certainly a long-term project that should have dollars allocated to it each year.”

Elliott said it needs to be priority.

“I-65 is a mess,” he said. “We’re lucky in Alabama to not have a morass of interstates that a lot of states do, but we have important mainline corridors. We need to upgrade and widen them. It will be expensive, but I think it can happen over time.”

He added, “You should pick and choose where you start, and I think your highest traffic areas are first.”