On July 17, Governor Underwood announced that construction would begin this Fall on a 3.5 mile section of Corridor H. This does not mean the end of resistance to a four-lane through the mountains. It doesn't even move Corridor H east of Elkins. The segment to be bid in August will extend the Corridor from its current terminus west of the city to U.S. 219 at Elkins’s northern limit. In effect, it will serve as a northwest bypass.

Corridor H Alternatives’ (CHA) press release said it did not oppose this section. The position wasn’t new, but it reached a new audience. Newspapers in Parsons and Moorefield printed the entire statement. CHA also supported new construction over South Branch Mountain east of Moorefield. However, CHA continued to demand improvements to the existing road network.

The significance of the go-ahead near Elkins was that the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) had also approved the highway around Corricks Ford Battlefield south of Parsons. Under the Programmatic Agreement between FHWA, the State Historic Preservation Officer, and the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation (ACHP), adjacent sections must be OK’d before construction can begin.

ACHP had found that Corridor H would have an "adverse effect" on Corricks Ford (Voice, May 1998). FHWA and ACHP took turns swinging at mitigation. FHWA proposed tinting concrete structures "to mimic the color of tree trunks and exposed rock faces." An ACHP official said that sounded like putting lipstick on a pig.

More elaborate offers included "special roadway structures," i.e.,bridges, along the steepest slopes of Fork Mountain above the battlefield. The model was Linn Cove Viaduct on the Blue Ridge Parkway. At a meeting in Charleston, federal and state highway engineers believed the Parkway was a four-lane road. They were equally vague about the cost. According to Figg Engineering, the firm that designed it in1982, the viaduct cost $170 per square foot. That worked out to $33.6 million per mile. Doubled for four lanes and increased by inflation, the cost of "special structures" could come in around $100 million a mile. Plus change for the lipstick.

ACHP complained about the vagueness of FHWA's commitments. But its most telling comment on the mitigation plan was this: "[W]e do not believe that any plan short of major relocation of the alignment could eliminate the adverse effects of the project." In short, Why are we here? Why not upgrade U.S. 219 and stay out of this remote, historic valley? FHWA had pledged to "utilize all feasible, prudent and practicable measures to avoid adverse effects to Register-eligible properties." That was its duty under Section 4(f) of the federal transportation law. Nevertheless, FHWA stubbornly avoided avoidance.

A related question under Section 4(f) was whether the highway’s adverse effect amounted to "constructive use" of Corricks Ford. FHWA declared that the battlefield’s value -- which qualified it for the National Register of Historic Places -- "does not derive

. . [from] its setting." No harm, no foul. That analysis contradicted ACHP’s. As we have seen before, though, with EPA, Interior, and other federal agencies, ACHP can’t or won’t enforce its own findings.

Just in case, Governor Underwood flexed his political muscle. He regretted that he wasn't around when EPA's Peter Kostmayer was fired. So when Kostmayer’s successor, Michael McCabe, halted permits for mountaintop removal mines, Underwood said, "I point out that the former regional administrator came out in opposition to Corridor H and he didn’t stay long."

In another political sideshow, Representative Bob Wise called for restrictions on the Keeper of the National Register of Historic Places. Wise was angry that the Keeper had recognized both Corricks Ford and Old Fields as Register-eligible sites. On the floor of the House, he said, "Just as the state is preparing to go to bid on this [Corridor H] project, who pops up? The Keeper."

Who failed to ask for the Keeper’s opinion three years ago? The West Virginia Division of Highways. CHA, the Highlands Conservancy and fourteen other organizations sued WVDOH and FHWA in part because of their belated, erratic, and inadequate efforts to protect historic and environmentally sensitive sites. If they had done it early and done it right, instead of waiting til they were ready to go to bid, they could have avoided those sites with a lot less fuss. Politicians tend to get angry about circumstances their allies helped to create.

In this Summer of ‘98, there are signs that the underfunded, overplanned Corridor might be re-examined. WVDOH agreed to study U.S. 50 in Hampshire County. A Hampshire Review reporter, Michael O’Brien, dug out the 1993 traffic projections for Corridor H which showed that even if the Corridor were built the traffic on Route 50 would still be greater. (WVDOH should recycle more of the Corridor H studies that have cost $33 million so far.) They’re not planning to four-lane the old Scheme E; instead, they’ll consider passing lanes and realignments.

Also, responding to our appeal in the Corridor H lawsuit, the defendants have conceded that "a component of the Appalachian Development Highway System [i.e., a Corridor] can be ‘completed’ by improving existing roads, building new roads, or a combination of the two . . ." That’s right. Let’s do that.

Until this reasonableness takes firmer root, government agencies will continue to bend over backwards for the politically-sensitive project. Private citizens and organizations must uphold the public interest. No one else is defending Corricks Ford, Otter Creek, the Shavers Fork, and the Fernow Experimental Forest. We have to stop them from turning east.