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

DATE: SATURDAY, May 14, 1994                   TAG: 9405160152
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C3   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: New River Valley bureau
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short

$5 MILLION AWARDED FOR EXPRESSWAY

The House of Representatives transportation subcommittee has approved $5 million for preliminary design work on a Coalfields Expressway in Virginia being pushed by Rep. Rick Boucher, D-Abingdon.

Boucher had asked the subcommittee to allocate the money to start planning for widening the route to four lanes from the West Virginia line to Grundy and Vansant in Buchanan County, along Virginia 83 to Haysi and Clintwood in Dickenson County and finally to Pound in Wise County. There the new route would intersect with U.S. 23.

Boucher said the expressway would attract manufacturing jobs to areas now lacking four-lane highways. He called the subcommittee's action ``a significant one in our long-term effort to achieve that goal.''

The action taken Thursday awards funds directly from the Federal Highway Trust Fund. It will be available as soon as President Clinton signs the legislation.

Boucher said the federal government will fund 80 percent of the environmental and design work, with the state paying the rest.

by CNB