In just two years, Missouri's Transportation department won't have enough money available to maintain the state's roads and bridges in the current conditions.
And that means MoDOT likely will pay more attention to the state's major roads - like U.S. 50, 54 and 63 across Mid-Missouri, plus some other roads like Missouri Boulevard and Missouri 179 in Jefferson City, and Providence Road and Stadium Boulevard in Columbia - than it pays to the supplementary system, including the state's lettered routes like B, C, D, M and W in Cole County.
"We have branded this as "Tough Choices Ahead,'" MoDOT Director Dave Nichols told the six-member Missouri Highways and Transportation Commission on Wednesday morning. "This is not a formal recommendation to you today, but it is for discussion, for your consumption."
Nichols said the proposal won't result in any roads being abandoned, but only a fourth of Missouri highways will be fully maintained.
But the supplemental roads will get only routine maintenance and emergency repairs.
He noted every county in the state has at least one primary road.
But, Commissioner Bryan Scott of St. Louis noted, pushing traffic toward the primary roads could cause more congestion on them.
Commissioners approved Nichols' recommendation that MoDOT staff statewide meet with various citizen, industry and other stakeholder groups to talk about the department's funding situation - and how MoDOT plans to maintain the system the state already has.
"Missouri voters spoke overwhelmingly (in August) that they did not want to use a sales tax as a funding mechanism for transportation, at least at this time," Nichols noted. "Our construction program (right now) is about $700 million a year - and it's going down at a very sharp pace.
"In 2017, we will see that we will be at $325 million a year - and that doesn't even allow us to take care of the ... very large highway system that Missourians have charged us with."
He said the department needs at least $485 million a year to maintain roads and bridges in their current condition.
Missouri's system includes nearly 34,000 miles of state-owned highways, the nation's seventh largest system. And only six states have more bridges than Missouri's 10,400.
"But we're 46th in the nation in funding-level, in revenue per lane-mile of road that we have," Nichols reminded the commissioners.
A 17 cents-per-gallon tax on motor fuels - among the lowest in the nation - provides MoDOT with 23 percent of its total revenues, with 70 percent of the income staying with the department and 15 percent each split among Missouri's cities and counties.
The Highway Patrol and Revenue department also get some of the money for their highways-related work.
Federal funding is 43 percent of MoDOT's income, although some of the federal money is earmarked for non-highway uses.
Chief Financial Officer Roberta Broeker told commissioners the long-term financial forecast isn't good, with dropping revenues, disbursements - and falling cash balances.
"None of the lines are going in the right direction," she said. "We're predicting that fuel taxes will continue to climb by about a half-percent a year.
"The biggest potential area of growth is sales taxes on motor vehicle sales."
And, although MoDOT officials think Congress might make more federal funds available to the states, Broeker said, "We no longer have enough state funds to match the federal funds."
And that means that dollars Missouri used to get to add more construction projects soon will wind up going permanently to other states, she said.
Commission Chairman Stephen R. Miller, a Kansas City lawyer, told reporters at a news conference after the commission meeting: "This is a problem that affects all Missourians, that needs to be addressed.
"I call it "transportation triage.' That is, we're left to make tough choices, just as they do in (a hospital) emergency room, about the most critical patients and the ones that need to be attended to first."
MoDOT's proposal for primary roads in Mid-Missouri doesn't include Route B between Jefferson City and Meta - even though Diamond Dog Foods uses the two-lane highway to get its products from Meta to the main transportation routes.
Miller acknowledged people may disagree with the proposed priorities, and may want the department and commission to modify the proposal Nichols made Wednesday.
"Let the discussion begin," he said. "I am confident we're going to hear other, dramatic cases how a decision we have made is going to affect a particular business.
"That's the reason we're putting it up front, today."
Missourians can review MoDOT's presentation at www.modot.org/toughchoicesahead.
"The reality is, we're going to have to live within $325 million," Miller said. "If people don't like that - they either learn to live with it or they increase the investment in transportation."