WHEELING - The idea of cutting through the hillside above the Wheeling Tunnel and eliminating the tubes has been abandoned by the West Virginia Division of Highways, according to Delegate Orphy Klempa.
The decision comes just as work is set to resume on the Wheeling Tunnel on Wednesday.
Klempa, D-Ohio, requested earlier this year that the DOH perform a feasibility study to determine whether it would be more cost-effective to eliminate the tunnel entirely and add additional lanes than to spend millions of dollars rehabilitating the tubes. The DOH agreed in February to do the study.
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Ohio Department of Transportation workers install signs on Interstate 70 eastbound between St. Clairsville and Bridgeport to warn about work that is set to begin in the Wheeling Tunnel on Wednesday.
But Tuesday, the agency announced that work would begin again on the tunnel. The decision to go ahead with the needed work indicates the state doesn't wish to take on a costly tunnel removal project, according to Klempa.
"They have decided to do the renovations and not the open cut," he said. "It is just too expensive a project at the present time, considering the financial health of the state. People are buying less gas, and less money is going into the highway coffers.
"It's a timing thing. It's the wrong time to do a project of that magnitude in the state of West Virginia," Klempa added. "The lack of dollars for roads doesn't make that project make sense, so they abandoned it."
Klempa, though, stands by his belief that eliminating the tubes is something that should be considered.
"I still think it's a good idea," he said. "In the long run, it will cost millions to keep the tunnel opened and maintained.
"There's also the safety issue," he continued. "This is the only spot in the nation where a major, four-lane highway goes down to one lane on each side. Hopefully, we can get that addressed in some manner. If someone is in the wrong lane, we don't want them to have to switch lanes in the tunnel."
The eastbound tube of the Wheeling Tunnel will close Wednesday, according to an employee for the project contractor, the Velotta Co.
Robert Jackson, job superintendent for Velotta of Sharon Center, Ohio, said Wednesday that the first work on the tunnel will be to remove the existing overspray on the tiles. After this, subcontractors will come in to do the needed work.
In the interim, detour signs are being placed along Interstate 70 and I-470 to alert motorists of the upcoming detour.