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View Full Version : A.T. Bridge Dedication November 8



TJ aka Teej
11-07-2003, 15:10
From http://www.appalachiantrail.org/trailnews/index.html

Pennsylvania A.T. Bridge Dedication November 8
A major new bridge over Route 225 in Pennsylvania, enhancing the safety of both motorists and Appalachian Trail hikers, will be opened officially with a ceremony atop Peters Mountain at 1:00 p.m. Saturday, November 8. Officials from the Appalachian Trail Conference, two clubs of volunteers who maintain the trail on either side of the highway, the National Park Service, and state agencies — all partners in trail management in general and this particular project — are expected to be involved in the ceremony. The 75-foot-long, 8-foot-wide walkway will carry trail users from cliff to cliff above traffic. They previously had to dart across a dangerous curve at which oncoming vehicles could not always even be heard. In addition, hikers and backpackers can enjoy new, spectacular views across the landscape to the south and north to the Susquehanna River.

DAUPHIN, Pa. — A major new bridge over Route 225, enhancing the safety of both motorists and Appalachian Trail hikers, will be opened officially with a ceremony atop Peters Mountain at 1:00 p.m. Saturday, November 8. Officials from the Appalachian Trail Conference, two clubs of volunteers who maintain the trail on either side of the highway, the National Park Service, and state agencies — all partners in trail management in general and this particular project — are expected to be involved in the ceremony. The 75-foot-long, 8-foot-wide walkway will carry trail users from cliff to cliff above traffic. They previously had to dart across a dangerous curve at which oncoming vehicles could not always even be heard. In addition, hikers and backpackers can enjoy new, spectacular views across the landscape to the south and north to the Susquehanna River. The trail's crossing of Pa. 225 was identified in the 1990s as a serious safety concern by volunteers from the Susquehanna Appalachian Trail Club and the York Hiking Club, who have day-to-day management responsibility for the legendary footpath on either side of the highway in Dauphin County. By the late 1990s, traffic volume already averaged almost 10,500 vehicles a day. Hikers crossed the highway at the height of land in a hairpin curve amid steep, cutbank slopes, with sight distance of about 100 feet. The posted speed limit in the curve is 15 mph. More than half of the 37 accidents reported between 1993 and 1997 involved out-of-control vehicles heading for stationary objects. The Appalachian Trail Conference, a national nonprofit organization that has over-all management responsibility for the trail under an agreement with the National Park Service (NPS), applied in November 1998 to the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation for a $315,000 grant of Transportation Enhancement Act (TEA-21) funds, which was approved in May 1999. As required by that program, an additional $77,000 was budgeted from NPS and private funds, along with ATC and volunteer time and services. Engineering, design, environmental reviews, utility clearances, and the bidding processes consumed a not-uncommon four years, with construction begun late this past August and recently completed. A free shuttle service to the ceremony site will leave from the Dauphin County Conservation Field Office at the foot of Pa. 225, near the intersection with Route 325, across from B&B Ice Cream.