Morgantown Dominion Post
15 September 2008
By Kathy Plum
On Saturday, a group of people boarded The Enchantress, a 52-foot coastal cruiser, at the Star City dock for a tour of something most see everyday but don’t give a second thought — the Monongahela River.
It’s an attitude the Upper Monongahela River Association and Mon River Recreation and Commerce Committee of the Morgantown Area Chamber of Commerce, who sponsored the tour, hope to change.
“I grew up in Morgantown, and this is only my second time on the river. I’m very interested in what it looks like on this side,” said passenger Delbert Royce, of Blaine Turner Advertising, which prepares promotional materials for the Greater Morgantown Convention and Visitors Bureau.
“It’s one of the economic engines for this area. It’s almost like an unused broad band,” said Barry Pallay, chairman of the Chamber of Commerce committee.
Each year, tour organizers try to introduce a new group of people to the river. Though he can’t point to a specific project that grew from these tours, Pallay said, “collectively, as the community becomes more aware of the river, good things happen. The momentum by involving more and more people with different interest groups has had a great impact.”
Grafton Mayor Tom Bartlett, owner and captain of The Enchantress, assured all who boarded Saturday that one of the things they wouldn’t experience on the Mon that particular day was turbulence.
“Unless we get a storm, this is going to be a sled ride on level ground,” Bartlett said.
That was true even as the craft went through the Morgantown Locks, one of the pieces of river infrastructure tour guides wanted to point out. Since cutbacks in the U.S. Corps of Engineers’ budget in 1985, the locks have had limited hours. And they, like all the locks on the river, as it winds its way to Pittsburgh, are aging and not slated for replacement.
Evidence of the river’s economic potential as a highway for goods is seen at industrial docks alongside Granville, Westover and Morgantown. Granville Mayor Patty Lewis and Council members Linda Tomago and Dave Bean talked about its potential as a commuter route as well.
Granville has leased land from CONSOL and hopes to soon have a gravel lot where commuters can park their cars and hitch a ride on Mountain Line buses to work. The town is working with Mountain Line to add a river taxi as well. Granville has $75,000 budgeted to begin development of the parking lots and a memorial park, and is seeking grants to continue the work.
Funding is always a problem, said Carol Thorn, of the Everettsville Historical Society. The society would like to make boat access to the river a part of its Miners Memorial Park, but for now they are struggling just to obtain office space and bathroom facilities.
The river’s history is integral to the area, Thorn said. She recalled how her great-grandfather worked at a mine called River Seam, at Booth, and miners crossed the river to get to work.
One of the river’s unexploited opportunities is fishing. Sue Thompson, director of 3 Rivers Ecological Research Center, with the Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission, notes Pittsburgh recently hosted a $2 million bass tournament. “This [river development] is far bigger than just Morgantown,” Pallay points out. And a quality fishery means more than anglers, noted one tour member.
“Fish live in water, so anything that affects water affects fish. I like to think that anything that is good for fish and fisheries is good for everything else,” said Frank Jernejcic, State Division of Natural Resources District I fish biologist.
Frank Jernejcic (above) talks about the Monongahela River during a tour on Saturday. - Kathy Plum/The Dominion Post photo
Yet between the Hildebrand and Morgantown Locks, The Enchantress passed only about five boats of anglers and less than 10 sitting along the riverbanks, along with spectacular scenery.
“This is the kind of scenery people up on Ten Mile Creek, in Pennsylvania, don’t have anything like. It’s special,” said Judy Reckart, of Reckart & Associates, who works with UMRA.
State Senator Roman Prezioso, D-Marion, is amazed at the lack of usage in the area, “because in Marion County people live in the river.”
“It’s one of those deals where somebody’s got to do it before everybody can do it,” said Reckart, who believes the locks and lack of roads and docks scare people off.
“All that potential for increased use is out there,” Pallay said.
The boat clears the Morgantown Lock and begins to head upriver - Kathy Plum/The Dominion Post photo.