SELINSGROVE — The state Department of Transportation could not have picked a worse time to pull the plug on the Central Susquehanna Valley Thruway project, according to Joe McGranaghan, who heads up the Greater Susquehanna Valley Chamber of Commerce transportation committee.
McGranaghan said the decision to place the project in hibernation was made in spite of two positive developments.
“Sen. James Oberstar last year made a commitment to try for funds for the bridge (over the Susquehanna River), which would have alleviated traffic problems in Northumberland and Lewisburg, although it wouldn’t have helped things on the strip,” McGranaghan said Monday.
“Sen. (Arlen) Specter was making progress in getting us on the Appalachian Development Corridor,” he went on. “He put a bill in to add Route 15 from Williamsport south to the corridor.”
PennDOT’s announcement blindsided economic development officials in the region, McGranaghan said, since any new developments probably will be on hold until the issue is resolved.
“All you had to do was see how badly the traffic was backed up on the strip on July 4,” he said. “That’s how it was on a holiday, but that’s how it will be every day if we don’t get this highway built.”
At a meeting last week for regional legislators and other officials, PennDOT officials came under tough questioning, McGranaghan said.
“We grilled them pretty hard,” he said. “We told them doing nothing is not an option.”
PennDOT told the group the escalating cost of construction materials, shrinking sources of revenues and the need to maintain existing highways were the main reasons for shutting down the project, which is estimated to cost $418 million. About $28 million already has been spent on property acquisition and design work.
“They had told us in the past there was funding available for everything up to the actual construction,” he said.
The last federal funds for the project came in the form of a $10 million earmark from former Sen. Rick Santorum and former Rep. Don Sherwood.
“We know we can’t build this road $10 million at a time,” said McGranaghan, “but if PennDOT had come to us, we could have tried to get an earmark from Rep. (Chris) Carney (Sherwood’s successor) to at least keep it going.”
He said he was fairly sure Carney could have helped, crediting him with creative “outside the box” thinking on a number of issues.
Carney said Friday that federal funding for the project was included in the next highway appropriations bill, which won’t be acted on until 2009.
McGranaghan said he’s not unsympathetic to PennDOT’s plight, but he felt the decision to shut down the project was “one more nail in the coffin.”
“They could have been more forthcoming about this. We might have been able to help,” he said.
According to McGranaghan, Mark Moroski, of the Route 15 Coalition, recently sat in on a meeting with Allen D. Biehler, state secretary of transportation, during which Biehler offered a list of projects PennDOT had decided were too expensive. The thruway was among them.
“I wrote a letter to Secretary Biehler asking where we stood and never received an answer,” McGranaghan said. “I guess this was our answer.”
There’s a stranglehold on economic development in the area now, McGranaghan said, but he vowed to keep working on a solution.
“We’ll just keep trying,” he said. “This is far too important to just give up.”
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Thruway decision gripes chamber official
McGranaghan says PennDOT ignored two developments
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