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Hood River News Editorial
November 11, 2006
The Road Less Taken is not supposed to be from a washout.
Damage of historic proportions hit Highway 35 after the Monday and
Tuesday flooding.
This important highway lies in ruins for lengthy stretches. By all
reports, the highway between Parkdale and Government Camp is largely a
disaster area. The damage, road work veterans say, is the worst in
memory. It is even worse than six years ago when the Hood River and
White River and surrounding creeks roared over their banks and ripped
out large sections of the highway in the same area.
Mt. Hood Meadows, the county’s largest private employer with a $5
million annual payroll, is all but cut off; 1,000 seasonal jobs may be
at stake. The recreational facility, an economic and social hub, is in
danger of losing an entire season. Meanwhile, commercial and tourism
traffic cannot pass through the upper valley.
The situation is serious, and action is needed. An economic lifeline
has been ripped up and rocked over, and within the bounds of reason
and engineering realities, something needs to be done as soon as
possible.
To borrow nature’s own metaphor, the road will be rocky. U.S. Rep.
Greg Walden started down that road Thursday with a tour of the
highway, two days after his resounding Second District victory.
Yet it was a day in which nationally his party saw its own form of
washout. The Hood River congressman went right to work. We encourage
Walden in his fact-finding, and hope that with the help of federal,
state and local agencies, the repairs to Highway 35 can happen as soon
as possible.
Welcome news is the action taken by just-re-elected Gov. Ted
Kulongoski. Admittedly, this is all constrained by the realities of
funding and engineering — let alone the raw need to remove the jumble
of logs, mud and giant boulders from what is left of the roadway.
Yet for the economic good of Hood River County, Highway 35 cannot be
allowed to become The Road Not Taken. |
