Tim Williams is the senior Vice President of McGraw-Hill Education. He said on Tuesday that Ohio is key when it comes to location, which is why the company has three distribution centers here.
"We can hit a very large percentage of the country within two days, 65% of country within two days. So for a location perspective, that is one of the reasons we are here," said Williams.
However, those transportation routes must be maintained for business to stay, ONN's Stephanie Mennecke reported.
"If they don't get important infrastructure, they won't be able to be located here in central Ohio," said Congressman Steve Stivers.
Stivers, who represents Ohio's 15th District, was one of four panelists on Tuesday discussing the importance of the transportation bill.
"I believe we can work with the house and senate and get a bill done," Stivers said.
The transportation bill is a bill that would focus on roads, bridges, infrastructure and mass transit.
"I consider this bill to be very desirable and we hope it gets passed," said ODOT Director Jerry Wray. "However it is a bridge to what we need to do sometime in the future."
Wray said that Ohio is faced with several billion dollar projects. One includes the Brent Spence Bridge in Cincinnati which has been deemed functionally obsolete. It is one of many large undertakings that the state faces, Mennecke reported.
"We are looking at rebuilding the interstates in or around urban areas in Cleveland, Toledo, Dayton and Columbus and when you do that it costs more now to redo that and maintain traffic than it costs to do that in the first place," Wray said.
This all needs to be done as Ohio faces some major financial difficulties.
"You got stagnant funding, inflation and a bigger and bigger program," Wray said. "It's an untenable situation and we cannot afford all of this."
That is why Ohio leaders came together to figure out how to keep Ohio moving forward when it comes to transportation needs.
Watch ONN and refresh ONNtv.com for the latest information.
