No matter what is done it will cause temporary discomfort and annoyance to somebody, no way around that. If traffic is the biggest issue you foresee then it is a fairly weak one, traffic will always exist and this would actually spread it out more.

The only valid point of your argument is that out west there aren't as many jobs that pay well...but there are some & overall that's a self-fulfilling prophecy because nobody wants to move out there and force that to start happening. There are still jobs though, and remote work is becoming more and more prevalent. All the issues people have with the western half of the state would start to disappear or get significantly better if it had more people moving out there.

There's no easy solution for all the issues the Eastern half of the state has, but people ignore one of them simply because of some crappy mindset. If people refuse to do things that would actually help the situation or offer solutions that make sense then wtf are you doing?

So tell me, what is the solution?

PS: Way to put words in my mouth.