Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, May 10, 1994 TAG: 9405100123
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-1 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: By BRIAN KELLEY STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: CHRISTIANSBURG LENGTH: Medium
The commissioners will pick up where they left off last month in an effort to present questions and issues on the controversial Interstate 73 proposal to the Montgomery County Board of Supervisors.
The proposed highway, which would pass through Giles and Montgomery counties en route to the Roanoke area, was the hot issue in the New River Valley in February and March. But since the state Transportation Board picked a specific corridor through the counties nearly two months ago, the issue has quieted down.
On Wednesday, the commissioners will go over a draft report titled, "I-73 and Montgomery County. How will it affect us?" The Planning Commission meets at 7 p.m. on the third floor of the Montgomery County Courthouse.
The report, prepared by the Planning Department staff, picks up where an April 13 brainstorming session left off. It includes an October to April timetable of I-73 events and a list of 27 questions for further study.
It also lists five possible positives of having a second interstate highway in the county and six possible negatives. The lists developed from a wide-ranging discussion involving seven of the nine commissioners, a key I-73 opponent and a Virginia Tech student who attended to get more information for a term paper.
The questions are listed in four broad categories of impacts: economic, social, land use and transportation and environmental/cultural.
The report shies away from making any direct recommendations to the Board of Supervisors, but it does recommend sources of information to answer the questions and includes an offer from the commissioners to perform more research.
And it's also predicated on one big question: whether the proposed Michigan to South Carolina highway will be built to interstate standards, or as Rep. Rick Boucher, D-Abingdon, suggested last month, to lesser, Appalachian Regional Commission standards.
by CNB