Upper Monongahela River Association, Inc.
P.O. Box 519
Granville, WV 26534-0519

Wednesday 21 August 2002

Congressman Alan B. Mollohan
2346 Rayburn House Office Building
Washington DC 20515-4801

RE: Lock Hours Information

Dear Representative Mollohan:

Thank you for your letter of 30 July.

I am writing to thank you for requesting that $5M be appropriated to allow the Hildebrand and Opekiska locks on the Upper Monongahela to be remotely operated from the Morgantown lock. Success with this demonstration project would certainly help foster the growth of both commercial and recreational boating traffic on the Upper Monongahela river in West Virginia. If successful the lessons learned could also help solve the far worse recreational boating problem on the Upper Allegheny river.

We in UMRA are aware of the development of technology for automated operations of locks. In light of your proposed demonstration project, we will request a briefing by the Pittsburgh District of the US Army Corps of Engineers (COE) on the status of such technology, and, what they would propose to do given that you obtain the funds you have requested.

In addition to UMRA, I am sure that the Pittsburgh-based River Navigation Coalition, to which we belong, will also want to hear this briefing. Others who will most surely want to attend such a briefing will be our Upper Mon Water Trails Vision 2020 committee of the Morgantown Area Chamber of Commerce (check out http://www.be.wvu.edu/umwt/), Pirates of the Allegheny, and, Boaters are Voters. The latter two groups can be checked out by going to http://www.anchorsaweighmagazine.com , and then, links to these organizations.

My point in stating all this, is that we have formed in the past two years several organizations in WV and PA that are focused on improved service from the Pittsburgh District of COE for commercial and recreational boating on Pittsburgh District rivers. We will continue to ask that Congress add boating recreation to COE's job jar, as what we face in the Pittsburgh District is also a nation-wide problem. Boating recreation needs an equal nationwide emphasis with COE's current historic waterways responsibilities for facilitating river commerce, flood control, and river flow maintenance.

Many of us are engineers and/or experienced commercial and recreational boaters. We thus would like to be involved in the proposed Upper Monongahela demonstration project, perhaps as an advisory committee, to ensure that we might become true believers that remote operation of lock chambers is as safe and effective as having a human lock operator running the lock.

We also hope that the goal of remote operation of locks, on the Upper Mon and then eventually on other national waterways, means that that at least during the recreational boating season (if not all year), locks will be open all day. This is an important goal and is a result we hope to see should your proposed demonstration project indeed result in very successful technology for remote operation of lock chambers.

Unfortunately, should President Bush's FY 2003 proposed budget for COE stand, then both the Upper Monongahela and Upper Allegheny probably will suffer further cuts in lock hours. So, while the demonstration project is pursued over the course of several years, we will probably face, starting with FY 2003 on 1 October 2002, further cuts in lock hours on the Upper Mon and Upper Allegheny. We thus ask that Congress appropriate the funds needed to forestall any further cuts in lock hours on the Upper Mon and Upper Allegheny, while the demonstration project is pursued.

We would like to meet with our PA and WV members of Congress that represent the rivers served by the Pittsburgh District of COE, before Congress reconvenes after Labor Day. If you could help organize such a meeting, we would be most appreciative.

We need a short-term solution to Pittsburgh District budget problems re lock hours. We need a long-term national solution to the lock hours problem and to the need to get boating recreation added to COE's job jar!! I also understand that both houses of Congress have recreational boating caucuses, and, I ask that you contact the leaders of these caucuses concerning what must be done. Recreational boating is rapidly becoming a major economic factor in the use of our waterways. We need to get the commercial and recreational users of our waterways working together to gain full funding of COE's waterway infrastructure and operations.

Let me comment on our Upper Mon problems, which are unlike the problems our recreational boating brethren face on the Upper Allegheny! Recreational boating folks on the Upper Allegheny have many shore-side marinas, restaurants, etc. But, they are hamstrung by miserly lock hours far less than what we now have on the Upper Mon.

We on the Upper Mon lack shore-side docks providing access to restaurants and the other amenities offered by our towns. However, through the Upper Mon Water Trails Committee, and, with the help of the WV Public Port Authority, we are pursuing a $100K grant from the federal Boating Infrastructure Grant (BIG) program. We thus hope to open up the Upper Mon in WV to recreational boaters, so that they can enjoy our boating paradise and also visit our communities and their enticements therein!!

Our BIG proposal calls for a holding tank pump-out station at Star City's existing 8'x100' dock. Docks would also be installed at Morgantown's McQuain Riverfront Park, Rivesville, Prickett's Fort, and, at the public boat launch ramp by the historic bridge and Palatine Park in Fairmont. Rivesville would also get a pump-out station.

This effort to attract long-range recreational boaters to the Upper Mon would be dealt a severe blow, however, if the Morgantown lock, now open all day all year, suffers cuts in FY 2003 and out-years. Putting the Morgantown lock on day shift only, an option apparently being considered by COE, would kill long-range recreational boating traffic south of the Morgantown lock. There is no way a boat can make a daytime round trip through the Morgantown, Hildebrand, and Opekiska locks in eight hours between Morgantown and Fairmont. Even now, with Morgantown open all day all year, and, Hildebrand and Opekiska open day shift only all year, one has to go like the literal "bat out of hell" to make this round trip!

As a point of note, we do have a cost benchmark concerning additional lock hours for the Upper Mon, provided by Mr. Charles M. Hess, Chief, Operations Division, Directorate of Civil Works, COE HQ Washington. In his 25 September 2001 letter to Senator Byrd, Mr. Hess states that it would cost $560,000 to return the Hildebrand and Opekiska locks to all-year operation. Or, half this cost if these locks were to be open all day during the six month recreational boating season from 1 May to 31 October.

Congressman Mollohan, we in your district, others in the Pittsburgh District of COE, and, recreational boating folks nationwide, need your help, and the help of all members of Congress who represent the region served by the Pittsburgh District. We also need the help of those members of Congress who represent states and districts with navigable waterways.

The cost of adequately funding COE's operating and maintenance needs nationwide for existing waterways facilities is not unreasonable. We hope that Congress would provide these funds, and also add boating recreation to COE's job jar.

Further, Congress should reauthorize the very successful Boating Infrastructure Grant program, which expires this year. We need the BIG program so we can in conjunction with our PA cohorts pursue further development of boating recreation on the Monongahela from Fairmont to Pittsburgh!

 

Sincerely,


Secretary

304-599-7585 (fax: 4131)

dcsoinks@westco.net

cc:
Senator Byrd
Senator Rockefeller
Senator Spector
Senator Santorum
Representative Murtha
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