Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, March 13, 1994 TAG: 9403110008
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-2 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: Steve Kark
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
By last weekend, the chairman of the Board of Supervisors, Larry "Jay" Williams, said he had received about a dozen calls. In addition, people haven't hesitated to share their views on the subject when they meet him on the street.
Williams estimates that about 95 percent of the people he's talked with say they're against routing the road through Giles.
Most seemed to oppose the road because they think it would do more harm than good, said Williams. A lot of people think U.S. 460 works well enough for the county's needs, and that the interstate would only harm the county's rural atmosphere.
One caller, who lives in Giles but used to work for the Federal Highway Administration in Washington, told him she favored the road only if it closely followed existing U.S. 460.
But that, all agree, is the one thing the proposed routes don't do. Instead, the map shows two squiggling paths that swing widely to either side of U.S. 460. One route has it dipping south of Pembroke toward Eggleston, then following Sinking Creek through Newport and out toward Catawba. The other has it running north of U.S. 460, then heading south through Blacksburg.
That's a big part of what makes this thing so hard to consider, says Supervisor George Hedrick. A lot of people have assumed all along that this highway would follow U.S. 460, he said. So the map was a bit of a surprise.
And to compound matters, this month the Transportation Department's resident engineer, Dan Brugh, told the supervisors that the final route could vary by as much as 10 miles on either side of U.S 460.
"We're looking at a broad, general corridor . . . and there are more possibilities than what is shown on the map," Brugh told the supervisors.
That's what makes this a tough decision, says Hedrick. "How can you vote for something that you don't know anything about?"
Hedrick says he hasn't received as many calls as Williams has, but he'd say they've run about 60 percent against the road.
"It all depends on who you talk to," he says. "If you ask the folks over in Narrows, they don't like it, because they think it'll ruin the town. But some folks out in the county think it's a good idea."
Hedrick says that because it appears that the majority of the people he's talked to oppose the road, he'll likely vote against it at the next supervisors' meeting.
If that happens, Hedrick would join Supervisors Williams and Bobby Compton in their opposition to the U.S. 460 routing, enough to swing the county against the highway as proposed.
This route for the highway is an issue of considerable importance for Giles. If it is approved, it will give the county a peculiar distinction, because, ironically, the nation's newest interstate highway, its oldest river and its longest footpath all would meet in Giles. That's something to think about. Williams says that a discussion of the road has been added to the agenda for Tuesday's meeting because of the amount of public interest in this issue.
Steve Kark is an instructor at Virginia Tech and a correspondent for the Roanoke Times & World-News. He writes from his home in scenic Rye Hollow, in a remote part of Giles County south of Pearisburg.
by CNB