Amazon pledged to help pay for roads near its big Nampa warehouse. Here’s the latest
Amazon money will go toward the Idaho 16 extension project that would bring the highway to Interstate 84.
In 2019, Amazon agreed to pay the city of Nampa $14 million for roadway improvements to alleviate the increased traffic the online retailer’s giant new fulfillment center just north of the freeway was expected to bring to the area.
Now that the center is completed and Amazon has paid up, Nampa partnered with the Idaho Transportation Department to use $4.7 million of the Amazon dollars on state projects, including Idaho 16.
On Tuesday, Feb. 22, the Nampa City Council assigned $2.3 million from Amazon to the transportation department to fund the extension of Idaho 16 from I-84 to Chinden Boulevard, U.S. 20/26. That is five miles of highway, according to the Idaho Transportation Department website.
Idaho 16 will connect to I-84 with an interchange less than one mile east of Star Road intersection, said Tom Points, senior director for Nampa Public Works.
The city will contribute $200,000 of its own money to that extension, the agreement said.
Amazon money will also partially fund the widening of Franklin Road from Star Road for about three-fourths of a mile east to the future Idaho 16. The fulfillment center is at the southwest corner of the intersection of Star and Franklin roads.
“That section of Franklin will still be two lanes unless we widen it,” Points said in a video call.
Nampa allocated $1.2 million of the Amazon funds to the widening project.
Amazon dollars will also go to fund the first phase of Nampa’s Intelligent Transportation and Video Analytics System, a $5 million project that would tie the city’s 80-plus traffic signals to a traffic management center.
Points said the traffic management center would allow the Nampa Public Works Department to make adjustments to the signals live, rather than having an employee go out to the signal and make adjustments to the control box.
“That would be a relatively low-cost way to improve traffic flow in real time in the city,” Points said.
