Heartland Boating
March 2000
H. Nelson Spencer, Publisher & Editor, in his Leadline column.
The Monongahela River, formed by the confluence of the West Fork and Tygart rivers just above Fairmont, W.Va., joins the Allegheny River at Point State Park at Pittsburgh to create the 981-mile-long Ohio River. The upper portion of the Mon flows through some of the most beautiful scenery West Virginia has to offer. It is a boater’s paradise. But is it in danger of becoming a "paradise lost?"
We recently got an e-mail from Donald Strimbeck, a resident of Granville, W.Va., on the Mon, who is campaigning to exert pressure on Congress to "fully fund the operations and maintenance of the Morgantown, Hildebrand, and Opekiska locks." The locks, each with a single 600-foot chamber, are located at miles 102, 108, and 115, respectively. Morgantown Lock is manned 24 hours a day, but Hildebrand and Opekiska are only in operation from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. The writer likes to make daylong boat trips to Fairmont and back. "That is hard to do lately, given the reduction in hours of operation of the Hildebrand and Opkiska locks. And it is {going to} get worse," he wrote.
The hours were reduced in the mid-1990s but not since then, said Dick Dowling, public affairs officer of the Corps of Engineers’ Pittsburgh District. As to the future, there are no short-range plans to reduce the hours of operation, he said, but long-range plans are tied to the budget and "cause for concern is understandable given the trend toward tighter budgets." Neither he nor Deputy District Engineer Les Dickson is aware of any future cuts, though.
Dowling explained that their authorized mission is to accomdate commercial traffic on waterways, and while recreational boating is not part of the mission, the Corps does everything possible to work with recreational boaters.
A comforting thought is that further reduction is not likely for commerce on the waterway, and as long as the locks are operated for the towboats and barges, they will be accessible for recreational boaters as well. So says the well-connected leader of an association for the development of navigation in the Ohio Valley who asked, "Can you imagine Sen. Robert Byrd approving reduced locking times on the Mon?"
A staunch supporter of waterway programs -- the Ohio River lock at Gallipolis Ferry, W.Va., bears his name -- Byrd is a real watchdog when it comes to cutbacks that might have an adverse effect on his constituency.
So for the meantime, anyway, it appears that the locks on the upper Mon will maintain their current schedules. It does mean that boaters planning trips there need to arrive at Hildebrand and Opekiska before 4pm or be faced with having to wait until the next morning.
Nevertheless, grassroots efforts to make Congress aware of the need for continued funding for the operation and maintenance of the upper Mon locks for the benefit of recreational and well as commercial interests should proceed, and we applaud Mr. Strimbeck for his initiative.