Truck route might be doomed

A multi-million dollar project being designed to eliminate heavy truck traffic in downtown Columbia is on life support.

The alternate truck route, or bypass, had been pulled off a transportation improvement program list for at least two years and may not make any lists at all.

Columbia Borough first learned that its plans for the truck route might be in jeopardy when they learned the plans were removed from the two-year list because the truck route was at least four years from construction.

There were recent reports that the truck route was dead because Governor Ed Rendell had pulled funds earmarked for the project to put into other road projects including the leasing of the turnpike and repair of bridges across the state.

Mayor Leo Lutz has spent much of the last two weeks contacting officials from the county, state and federal governments. He addressed the Lancaster County Commissioners and the County’s Municipal Planning Organization last week. He presented commissioners with copies of an old petition that Columbia residents were asked to sign more than a year ago when a public meeting was held at the high school.

For more, see this week's Columbia Ledger.