By Jessica Moore

Staff Writer

The Tennessee Department of Transportation held its Region 3 Summit at the Lewisburg Recreation Center on Tuesday.

The first to speak was Lewisburg Mayor Jim Bingham. He welcomed the guests and introduced John Schroer the Commissioner of Transportation. He is the 29th commissioner of the state agency that oversees a statewide transportation system including highways, rail, airports, waterways and mass transit.

Schroer also welcomed the guests and made a few jokes before introducing the speaker, Director of Long Range Planning Tanisha Hall.

The presentation was upbeat and very interactive. Guests were given "clickers" to use to answer multiple-choice questions anonymously. The answers would then be displayed on the screen. One question was, "How much does a person spend a year on average for gas/road taxes?"

The majority of those present answered "$900," however, according to TDOT, the answer is actually $300.

The point of questions like that was to show the guests where TDOT gets its money. One fact that seemed most interesting was that the Tennessee Department of Transportation is debt free. Tennessee is a "pay as you go" state and only approves projects they can afford to fund.

"We do not borrow money to build roads," said Project Planning Director Steve Allen. According to a poll done by CNBC, Tennessee is ranked second highest in the nation for quality of transportation and infrastructure.

"It's because we take care of our roads," said Hall.

TDOT is predicting that by 2040 Tennessee will be home to 8.5 million people. The purpose of the 25-Year Long-Range Transportation Plan is to address how the changing demographics will impact transportation demands across the state. Some of the questions asked by TDOT were how residents of Tennessee think the roads should be maintained, and whether or not there should be new roads built or widened to take care of areas with major congestion.

The majority of those polled during the conference felt fixing areas of concern was more important than adding new roads. Others felt that new roads would help bring business and industry to areas in need. TDOT would like to hear from the people of Tennessee. They urge the public to visit the 25-Year Long-Range Transportation Plan website, take the online survey, and share their thoughts or transportation needs. Visit www.tdot.state.tn.us/transportationplan.