MORGANTOWN — What happens when the street you live on becomes impassable?
Several things, according to Alpine Street resident Derek Jackson — you hope you never need the assistance of first responders, you forego mail delivery and, on occasion, you just park where you can and walk home.
“We desperately need some help with our road,” Jackson told members of the Monongalia County Commission on Wednesday.
Alpine Street is located between Riddle Avenue and Bergamont Street, in the West Run area.
“As it stands, certain vehicles can’t get through at any time of the year, but in the winter, it’s virtually impassable by any vehicle, regardless — four-wheel drive truck, car, it doesn’t matter,” he said.
Jackson said he paid for an engineering study in order to get a cost estimate on a potential fix.
Just the lower portion of the street, which he confirmed as an orphaned road through the DOH, would cost $100,000. He said there remains some question as to who is responsible for the upper portion of the street. If that part were added, it would be another $40,000.
In 2021, the commission created an orphaned road fund for such projects, but this proposition presents challenges in that it will cost so much to ultimately aid so few.
Previous projects funded include $67,000 from the county to assist 49 households on Bridge Road. Those households pulled together $47,400 for the work.
The commission also put up $44,000 to address Pinecrest/Farmview Road, which provides access to some 400 homes and apartments. Citizens in that area raised just over $43,000 as part of the funding package.
Jackson said he’s got commitments for about $12,000, which represents $1,000 each from nearly all the residences along the lower stretch of Alpine Street.
“We’ve been struggling with that. Maybe we could compartmentalize the work so a certain part is done one year, and a certain part is done another,” Commissioner Sean Sikora said, adding, “We need to give you a final decision or some plan as far as if we can help you and how we could do that. It’s on us to get back to you.”
Sikora noted the commission has limited resources to address roads, which outside this voluntarily created program, are not the county’s responsibility.
The need for the orphaned road program stems in large part from the lack of any county regulation over development. Developments continually spring up along roads that may have been built decades ago to access a single property or simply thrown down by a developer with no thought to maintenance or repairs.
In 2021, Sikora said the county was looking to head off future issues of this sort with the implementation of subdivision regulations, which were being finalized.
That process continues.
“We talked a couple weeks ago about getting an update from our planner on where the subdivision regulations process is,” Sikora said Wednesday. “We need to move forward on that and have that discussion.”
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