Rooftop highway proposal controversial

By Patricia Fifield
Clinton County had a 9.0 percent unemployment rate for September of this year. St. Lawrence County is at 7.8 percent. Miles of Route 11 and tiny towns separate these two counties, but they share the same poor economy and unemployment. Income is low, jobs are few and far between, and the youth is leaving for greener pastures. Businesses do not seem to be attracted to the North Country, which causes greater unemployment and poverty in the region.
Route 11 in New York proceeds northwestward from the Pennsylvania border and reaches Quebec. When the highway was constructed in 1924 it may have been all the state needed, but times are changing. “We need something better up here. Bigger. This whole place is slowly turning into a ghost town,” said Charlie Palmer. Palmer lives in Rennselaer Falls, located just outside of Canton. He said throughout his 40 years in the area he has never seen it this bad. “We all used to have jobs, things to do, but not anymore.”
The Developmental Authority of the North Country is proposing a Rooftop Highway, formally called the Northern Tier Expressway or Interstate 98. The four-lane expressway would connect I-87 in Champlain to I-81 in Watertown, which would bypass the heavy truck traffic on Route 11. With a large highway in the area that could easily connect the rural communities of the North Country to bigger cities, some think businesses would be more interested in the area and jobs will follow.
Local business owner Stephen Moore believes having an Interstate in the area would be beneficial to all small businesses. “We would have more traffic around here and then get more business,” he said.
There is another side to this story: Environmentalists are against the I-89 proposal and believe the new highway could threaten the Adirondack Park. The park was created in 1892 by the state and according to the Adirondack Park Agency (APA) it is the largest publicly protected area in the U.S. It’s bigger than Yellowstone, Everglades, Glacier, and Grand Canyon National Park combined with 6 million acres. Three highways currently surround the Adirondack Park: the Northway, Thruway, and I-81. The Rooftop Highway would be to the North of the Park, parallel to Route 11, and environmentalists believe it would close in the Park.
John Sheehan of The Adirondack Council said the highway would cut off the Adirondacks from animal migration and higher speed limits on I-98 could endanger the lives of animals. “It would also make more remote areas of the Adirondacks more easily accessible and therefore more vulnerable to irresponsible logging and unplanned development, much the way the Adirondack Northway led to a major shift in development,” he said. Sheehan said communities along the Northway have seen economic decline unless they were areas that were blessed with an exit ramp.
The Rooftop Highway or I-98 continues to be a hot debate in the area. According to adirondackalmanack.com, the federal stimulus package has set aside only $1.1 billion for New York state highway and bridge projects. Maybe this highway to nowhere will take some more time.