Editor,
Did you notice that Corridor H Authority Chairman Robbie Morris’s recent column in The Inter-Mountain never mentioned the separate Truck Route?
The Truck Route may be DOH’s best kept secret. It gets very little publicity, and when I bring it up to people in our community, I often get the response, “What truck route?”
WVDOH and its supporters don’t talk much about it. But those of us who live here want the full story about the DOH preferred route (now called R- ROPA) and its sidekick the Truck Route.
We want answers to the following questions: Would the Truck Route be constructed before, after or at the same time as the R-ROPA? Would existing Route 32 need to be widened? What would be the detours and delays for local traffic, school buses, etc. on Route 32 and Route 219 during construction?
If you dig around in the Supplementary Documentation to the Federal Highway Administration’s Notice of Intent, you will find a bit of info on the truck route: it’s now officially called the Thomas Truck Route and after it wraps around Thomas it will intersect with Route 32 at the Knights of Columbus ball field where it will dump all the trucks onto …
… our only local road, Route 32, which will be renamed WV Route 32/Truck Route, and this two-lane road will handle all the traffic and trucks traveling north and south on the mountaintop.
The Notice of Intent says, “These proposed changes will be more likely to assure that truck traffic southbound will utilize the Truck Route.” Not very encouraging.
The upcoming SEIS will compare two alternatives based on factors such as “ability to maintain design speed” and “efficient traffic flow.” If those were the goals of the DOH preferred route, why design a second road that would force trucks to slow down and share a 2-lane with school buses and locals driving to work, the grocery store or the dentist – especially when there’s a prudent and feasible alternative northern route? I believe truck drivers would agree.
To understand what’s coming, Travis Long of the WVDOH reiterates at each meeting that truck traffic is going to increase dramatically at the completion of the Kerens to Parsons section of Corridor H.
The Northern Route eliminates the need for a tacked-on truck route and takes the trucks off the streets of Thomas.
Nancy Luscombe
Davis, WV
