Block · one region of the page, as the scanner read it. It may hold a whole story, part of one, several, or an advertisement; stitching blocks into articles is the next step. Text is supplied OCR.
Page 1 · column 1 of 6 · from the scan, no model involved
By DAPHNE HUTCHINSON
Rappahannock Newa Staff Writer
If Fauquier Planner Richard McNear was a messenger, he’d be missing his head by now. .
Decapitation was the punishment meted out to the bearers of bad tidings in ancient times, and Mr. McNear’s warning of plans for a new superhighway is a message of gloom and doom for local governments battling to control and direct escalating development.
At the direction of the Fauquier Board of Supervisors, Mr. McNear is traveling the Piedmont government circuit, soliciting support for a cooperative effort to “impact” the highway planning process. Last week, he told the Rappahannock supervisors that the proposed outer beltway or western bypass would mean to Rappahannock County what the Capital Beltway has meant to Prince William County, in terms of increasing development pressure.
While not opposing an outer beltway per se, Fauquier’s supervisors have written the governor requesting that no portion of the road come through their county. Likewise, opposition is strong in Loudoun County, with the Loudoun Times Mirror leading the way. “At a time when it (the Virginia Department of Highways and Tranpsortation), and the Commonwealth, desperately need funds for highway construction, engineers with heads in the clouds blithely pursue the Outer Beltway, all set to squander $1.2 million on planning the unwanted road, when those funds could, and should, be used to answer real and present needs,” the newspaper editorialized.
Highway planners and politicians have countered concerns with assurances that the highway’s construction lies far in the future. Responding to the resolution from the Fauquier supervisors, Virginia Governor Gerald Baliles stressed that the proposed bypass is in the preliminary stages and that money has been allocated only to begin feasibility studies.
R. C. Lockwood, head of the highway department’s planning office, insists there’s been no decision yet on what route the superhighway might take. “We’ve got crude sketches” of where the bypass might go, he told The Fauquier Democrat
91.8%