Pa. Turnpike interested in beltway easements over trail
Someday, those walking or biking on the Panhandle Trail may look up and see the bottom of a Southern Beltway bridge.
The Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission contacted Lisa Cessna, director of the Washington County Planning Commission, about what are known as “aerial easements” over the rails-to-trails conversion that runs for 23 miles through the northern part of the county from Collier Township, Allegheny County, to Colliers, W.Va., near Weirton.
On Wednesday, at an agenda-setting session, Cessna asked the county commissioners to approve a $12,500 agreement of sale for the 1.054-acre aerial easement across the trail and a drainage easement of 0.046 acres. Drainage will be from the beltway road, not the bridge.
“The abutments are well off of (county) property,” Cessna said after Wednesday’s meeting.
The Turnpike Commission also is seeking an approximately half-acre, temporary construction easement for $2,100 so that it can build two crossings over the trail, one in Mt. Pleasant Township at the Fort Cherry Connector road and the other in Robinson Township near Primrose, as parts of interchanges.
“We’ve been negotiating the easements since summer,” Cessna said. The county commissioners expect to vote on the matter at their meeting scheduled for 10 a.m. today.
Government entities do not file condemnations against another government’s property.
The first part of the Southern Beltway, known as the Findlay Connector, has been open since 2006.
The second segment is planned from Route 22 in Robinson Township, Washington County, to Interstate 79 near Southpointe. The Turnpike Commission will seek construction bids for this segment in July 2017, and the 13-mile piece of the beltway is tentatively scheduled to carry traffic in late 2019.
“We are building a connector road from Route 980 to the expressway,” said Michael Houser, Turnpike Commission engineer project manager, in a phone interview, about activity related to the project Cessna discussed with the county commissioners.
The third and final part of the Southern Beltway is planned from I-79 to the Mon-Fayette Expressway, Route 43, at Finleyville.
The Panhandle Trail extends west from another rails-to-trails conversion, the Montour Trail. Both are part of the region’s industrial heritage, when coal was shipped in freight cars as a vital component of the steelmaking process.
In another agenda item coming from the county planning commission, Cessna recommended that the commissioners approve a temporary staging lease with Range Resources allowing the natural gas and oil extraction company to add soil to the upper parking field of the Washington County Fairgrounds as it brings equipment for nearby well-digging at the beginning of the new year. The fair board has given its consent, she said. Approval is contingent upon Range obtaining all necessary approval from Chartiers Township and the Washington County Conservation District for permits and zoning.
“They’re not disturbing the soil,” Cessna said, but Range does plan to fell some trees.