Robbie Morris
[ infrastructure ]
The Corridor H Highway Authority
Under
Construction
The Potential of Corridor H
Cutting through the mountains of North
Central West Virginia, Corridor H holds the
promise of desperately needed economic development opportunities for the areas it spans.
This section of four-lane highway stretches
130 miles from I-79 at Weston, WV, to the
Virginia border, where it is designed to travel
an additional 13 miles to the I-81 junction
near the I-66 junction at Front Royal, VA.
While great progress has been made toward
its completion in recent years, it remains the
only Appalachian Corridor project left to be
completed in West Virginia.
The story of Corridor H began in 1964
when the President’s Appalachian Regional
Commission (PARC) reported to Congress
that economic growth in Appalachia would
not be possible until the region’s isolation
could be addressed. Because the cost of
building highways through the mountainous
terrain was high, the region had never been
served by an adequate road system. At the
time, the infrastructure in place was a network of narrow, winding, two-lane roads
that snaked through the slender stream
valleys or over mountaintops. Travel was
slow and potentially dangerous for drivers.
The nation’s interstate highway system had
largely bypassed the Appalachian region
because it wasn’t cost-effective to trudge
through the region’s rugged terrain. Because
it lacked a modern transportation system,
the region was losing out on billions of dollars in economic development.
Supported by the PARC report, the Appalachian governors at the time felt it was
a top priority to build a modern highway
system to foster economic development in
the region. As a result, Congress authorized the construction of the Appalachian
Development Highway System (ADHS) in
the Appalachian Regional Development Act
of 1965. The ADHS was designed to generate economic development in previously
isolated areas, supplement
the interstate system, connect ExEdge
Appalachia to the interstate
Front Royal,
system and provide access to VA, has a large
national markets.
inland port with
In West Virginia, six Ap- double-stack
palachian highways were de- rail service to
the largest,
veloped as part of the ADHS: deepest port
Corridor D, which is Route in the eastern
50 from Clarksburg through U.S. at Norfolk.
Parkersburg; Corridor E, Source: www.
which has become I-68; Cor- corridorh2020.
ridor G, which is US 119 from com
Charleston to Pikeville, KY;
Corridor L, which is Route 19 from Beckley to I-79 passing through Summersville;
Corridor Q, which incorporates highways
52, 19 and 460 in Southern West Virginia,
and Corridor H. Of these, only Corridor
H remains unfinished.
Today, the ADHS includes 3,090 miles
across Appalachia, almost all of which are
completed. The Corridor H highway in West
Virginia is currently 82 percent complete or
under construction/contract and is scheduled
to increase to 87 percent by 2018.
The west-bound lane of Corridor H
approaching Davis, WV, nears completion.
summer 2016
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