Allegheny River Service Cuts to Reduce Hours of Operation
Leader Times
26 September 2011
By Renatta Signorini
Tammy Wensel loved traveling south on summer days, floating along
the Allegheny River and spending the day with friends.
She and her husband Eric Wensel would make a day of it -- from
Bradys Bend through Locks 9 at Rimer and 8 at Templeton before
grabbing a bite to eat at the Allegheny Mariner in Kittanning.
Those trips will be a thing of the past with a service reduction
plan being implemented in late October by the U.S. Army Corps of
Engineers in response to federal budget cuts.
"It's not just us," she said. "There's quite a crowd from up there
who do that same routine."
The reduction plan is necessitated by a significant cut in federal
funding for the Allegheny River navigation system -- from $8.4
million to $4 million, according to the Corps of Engineers. The
plan was decided on in March by the Corps after two public
hearings at which boaters and residents could state their opinions
on the possibility of service at the locks being changed or
eliminated.
Significantly affected in the plan is Armstrong County, home of
Locks 5-9, where recreational boating and tourism play important
roles. The upper two locks -- 8 and 9 -- will be closed completely
to recreational boaters as part of the plan -- commercial lockages
will be available by appointment. Locks 6 and 7 -- Clinton and
Kittanning -- will be open on weekends and holidays during boating
season for recreation and commercial traffic.
For the Wensels, the plan impedes their downtime. But for others,
the changes could affect their livelihood.
Lauren Chorney, co-owner of Rosston Eddy Marina, said some boats
docking there are too large to be trailered around to various
spots.
"You can go to any lake and be lakebound," she said. "But one of
the reasons they boat here rather than a lake is because they can
go somewhere. If you can't go anywhere, it kind of loses the
impetus of the whole thing."
"A lot of boats would go through on the holidays because they like
to go to East Brady," she said. "Those people up north can't come
down here anymore."
The service reduction plan will affect business, Chorney said.
"It's not getting any easier and the locks being closed don't help
it a bit," she said.
It won't be a good thing for Jeff Larkin, owner of the Allegheny
Mariner where boaters can dock during warmer months and come in
for drinks or a meal.
"In the summertime, our business thrives because of the boaters,"
Larkin said. "We get a lot of customers from the upper two pools
in the summer."
He thinks customers may stop coming because "they're not going to
get in their car and drive down on a sunny Sunday afternoon."
Arts on the Allegheny chairwoman Mary Ann Valasek said boaters
enhance the experience of the organization's summer concert series
in the John Murtha Amphitheater of Kittanning Riverfront Park.
"We love the boaters, it's a great backdrop," she said. "I thought
it was a dimension to the whole concert series."
Valasek said she is thinking about requesting the locks be open on
concert days -- the Corps has said it would be willing to provide
service for special events.
"The artists love it," she said.
No choice
Army Corps of Engineers Allegheny River Initiative project manager
Kevin Logan said the budget for operations and maintenance on the
waterway was essentially cut in half from $8 million to $4
million. That left the Corps with the job of determining how to
make the system work with about half as much money.
"We had to go out and look at how are we going to operate and
maintain that river with what we were going to get," Logan said.
The Corps came up with some options and presented them to the
public during two comment-gathering sessions. The plan was
announced in the spring.
"This is all based on the feedback we've gotten," he said, adding
that the Corps is about halfway through the process of identifying
other opportunities in the region for employees currently working
at the affected locks.
On or about Oct. 23, the Corps will start implementing the
reductions, he said.
"We're trying to push this out to get the boating season in,"
Logan said, and the plan could be fully in place by the end of the
year. "It's not going to happen overnight."
Armstrong County will be affected greatly, said Logan and Jeff
Hawk, Corps Pittsburgh district spokesman. Because the county sees
a minute amount of commercial river traffic, that has resulted in
the funding decrease.
"It's a very low-use river," Hawk said. "It would take a lot of
commercial traffic" to get the Allegheny River back on the radar
of the federal government.
"That's just not very likely," he said of the possibility that
commercial traffic would increase and the locks would reopen.
Even so, Logan said the Corps is working with a newly-formed local
entity to determine ways that the locks may be able to remain
open. The Allegheny River Development Corporation met for the
first time last week as a task force to examine potential ways to
get the locks rebooted possibly as some sort of public-private
partnership.
The county commissioners sought interested residents to
participate in the task force as a means to keep the facilities
viable following the Corps' decision. There are some instances
around the country in which agreements with nonprofits have been
struck by the Corps. Those could be used as models and jumping off
points for the county.
The key to keeping at least recreational usage at the locks is in
the hands of the corporation as it continues work with the Corps.
"Is there anything out there we can do to get this service back?"
Logan said.
The changes
The Allegheny River Service Reduction Plan is scheduled to be
implemented on or about Oct. 23.
- Locks 2-5 (Highland Park Bridge-Schenley): Two eight-hour
shifts, seven days per week for commercial and recreational
traffic.
- Locks 6-7 (Clinton-Kittanning): One shift on Saturdays,
Sundays and holidays from May 1-Sept. 30 for commercial and
recreational traffic. Commercial lockages available by
appointment.
- Locks 8-9 (Templeton-Rimer): Closed to recreational
boaters. Commercial lockages available by appointment.
- Additional hours for special events will be considered.
By the numbers
Allegheny River statistics from U.S. Army Corps of Engineers:
- River system usage by average ton miles from 2004-09
- Upper Mississippi, 161.6 billion
- Cumberland, 2.5 billion
- Monongahela, 1.2 billion
- Allegheny, .037 billion
- Total vessels traveling through Locks 2-9 between
2000-09, 25,137
- Commercial vessels, 6,430
- Recreational vessels, 18,708
- Fiscal Year 2010 Costs, $8.3 million -- of that $5.7
million is for operations and $2.6 million for maintenance
Renatta Signorini can be reached at rsignorini@tribweb.com or
724-543-1303, ext. 219.