DALLAS, Aug. 18 (UPI) -- Federal officials Wednesday announced that a highway that is a key to the $1.2 billion Trinity River project in Dallas will go on a special fast track.
Federal Highway Administrator Mary Peters said the Trinity River Parkway project would get expedited treatment in the environmental and regulatory permitting process.
The Dallas project was one of six selected out of 52 nominations from 16 states. Four were announced earlier in Ohio, Utah, Georgia, and Connecticut. The sixth will be announced Thursday.
The Trinity River Parkway, which may be a toll road, will relieve congestion in the Dallas "mixmaster" where Interstates 30 and 35E intersect downtown.
The road is part of the Trinity River Corridor Project that will bring new flood protection to the city along with lakes, parks, wetlands and three modernistic bridges designed by Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava.
A centerpiece of the Dallas urban park, 10 times larger than New York's Central Park, will be the Great Trinity Forest, more than 1,000 acres of trees and grassland that is said to be the largest urban forest left in the United States.
