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May

24

Highways to Nowhere

May 24, 2006 |

ghostbrownsville2.jpgThe legislature seems to be balking on finishing the Mon Valley Expressway.  Costs and other priorities are catching up with all the fancy plans made during the 1990s.

Here at the TRP&S, we are no fans of excessive highway building, especially in the face of rising gas prices — a phenomenon that is hardly going to reverse thanks to the Federal Reserve, increased global oil demand, and a lack of major new discoveries while the major existing fields have passed their peak and are on the decline.  Afterwards, the roads just become one more expensive upkeep project.  But it always seems some big shot politician is in line to have his legislative district in line for a new road that will someday bear his name.

ghostbrownsville.jpgThe Mon Valley may have been the place to live 50 and 100 years ago at the height of Greater Pittsburgh industry; there was a point where the sky was the limit. But at this point, the sun has set…  There are far greater problems facing the economies of Pittsburgh, of PA and the U.S.A.   For the time being — interstate highway or not — the Brownsville’s and other ghost towns of the region will be absorbed back into the hills of West Virginia.


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