
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, March 20, 1994                   TAG: 9403220019
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: B-2   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

NEW RIVER VALLEY ALSO NEEDS I-73

WEST VIRGINIA and North Carolina officials want to use existing Interstate 77 through Virginia as the leg to connect new highways in their respective states. That would cut Virginia out of the economic-development action, but Virginia's well-being isn't their concern.

It is a concern, though, of Virginia's Commonwealth Transportation Board, which last week endorsed routing the proposed Interstate 73 instead through the New River and Roanoke valleys, then down the U.S. 220 corridor to Martinsville and Greensboro, N.C. - a route that would cut Virginia in on the economic-development action.

Harder to fathom than either of the above is the opposition in Giles County and Blacksburg to routing the highway through their communities. The Giles supervisors have gone on record opposing such a route, and Blacksburg Town Council - retreating from an earlier stand - has voted its objection to any route that would bring the highway within the town limits.

From that, you might conclude that the route favored by Virginia would wreak havoc on pristine wilderness; or that a straight-line connection between Detroit, Mich., and Charleston, S.C., (I-73's termini) is of such self-evident importance that other interests should be set aside; or that the economies of Montgomery and Giles counties need no improvement; or that the economic benefits of improved transportation networks are trivial and transitory.

None of those points happens to be true.

The environmental irony is that the place on the route where care most needs to be taken is the "smart road" portion that (a) is likely to be built anyway for other good reasons and (b) was specifically supported in the Blacksburg resolution. Elsewhere through most of Giles and Montgomery counties, I-73 would follow the corridor of U.S. 460 - an arterial, though not interstate-standard, highway that already exists. Local governments and the public should guard against inappropriate development. But while vigilance against bad scenarios is wise, self-paralysis from fear of worst-case scenarios is itself a worst-case scenario.

The purpose of the interstate-highway system is to connect population centers within the national grid, and not simply those cities that happen to lie at the edges. In itself, the need for an interstate link between Detroit and Charleston is minimal. If the aim were a straight-line superhighway between those distant places, the route would run somewhat west of Bluefield, W.Va., and considerably west of North Carolina's Piedmont Triad region. The new highway is likely to be built precisely because it wouldn't do that, but instead will incorporate a Bluefield-Huntingon connection in West Virginia and in North Carolina will pass through the Triad.

The issue is not whether I-73 will jig and jag along the way from Detroit to Charleston. It will. The issue is whether Virginia, by having a route through the New River, Roanoke and Martinsville areas, is to be similarly served. If routed along I-77, the new I-73 would do nothing for Virginia. It would be, as 77 is now, simply a conduit for trade and traffic to cross an empty quarter of the state, stopping for little but gas, burgers and maybe a motel room.

Perhaps the economic impact of burgers and gas, minor as it is, should not be dismissed too cavalierly, given the condition of the Giles and Montgomery economies. In Giles between 1989 and 1993, the number of jobs grew by only 1.5 percent and the after-inflation average weekly wage rose not all. In Montgomery County, after-inflation weekly wages fell slightly - and, especially ominous, the number of jobs plummeted by 8.3 percent.

Still, if interchange villages - and the highway construction itself - were the only economic boosts, the benefits would indeed be trivial and transitory. Transportation infrastructure, however, has a far more basic economic purpose.

Good transportation - good links between one city or region and others - is the means by which producers connect with markets, suppliers with producers. Good roads are an essential component of a good transportation system.

Employment and population centers that forget this have a way of becoming centers of unemployment and depopulation.

by CNB