Slides Bring New Focus On U.S. 95 Legislators To Consider Options In Fixing Highway

Sever a major highway on the eve of the Legislature opening and suddenly one of Idaho’s most ignored problems becomes more important to lawmakers.

Hours after lawmakers convene Monday, the House Transportation Committee will hold a hearing on U.S. Highway 95, which in some places is as much river bottom and avalanche chute as it is road. The Senate Transportation Committee will be invited to the hearing, said Rep. Jim Kempton, R-Albion and committee chairman.

Floods and mudslides closed one lane of U.S. 95 New Year’s Eve and then torpedoed the route in a dozen places from Riggins to Weiser by early New Year’s Day. Some portions of the highway are still under water.

The alternate route through some of that part of the state, Idaho Highway 55, also is closed because of slides covering more than eight miles of road. One of the slides plopped more than 100,000 cubic yards of debris on the road.

The highway may not reopen in some places for a week or more.

These problems and a 36-hour closure of U.S. 95 during Thanksgiving week are reviving the call for fixing the highway once and for all. But Kempton isn’t sure that is the solution.

“We probably could have redone it and it still would have washed away,” he said. “It’s a terrain issue and a geography issue” that may continue to be a problem as long as the road runs so close to rivers.

Yet, “it’s the only north-south surface artery,” said John Goedde, of the Coeur d’Alene Chamber of Commerce.

When it’s closed, “the blood doesn’t go either direction.”

The Chamber is behind another attempt at Rep. Hilde Kellogg’s proposal to finance reconstruction of the entire road with long-term bonds. Under her proposal, which failed to move out of the House last year, voters would give final approval to borrowing the money.

This year’s proposal will ask for about $350 million, Goedde said. That would take care of widening, adding passing lanes and guard rails to Idaho’s so-called goat trail, which opened in 1923.

Delay is costly. Inflation adds about $10 million a year to the price of dealing with the 538-mile road.

Even if Kellogg’s bill passes, it will take until 1998 to get it on the general election ballot. “So we’re talking about $20 million in additional cost, just because of that,” Goedde said.

Ignoring the problems also has a high price, he said. The Panhandle’s tourism economy collects $643 million in revenue from surface transportation, Goedde said. The next region south collects one-tenth of that.

“It’s not that it’s less beautiful or has fewer tourist attractions, it’s just harder to get to,” Goedde said.

The town of Pend Oreille collects $3.5 million in sales tax, which is distributed statewide so it benefits all of Idaho.

If the highway isn’t fixed, business in central Idaho will wither. The Idaho Department of Commerce says temporary transportation routes essentially become permanent routes if they are used for five years, Goedde said. That means U.S. 395 - through Washington - and Interstate 84 - through Oregon - are in danger of becoming the permanent way of driving from North Idaho to southern Idaho.

Indeed, Rep. Larry Watson, D-Wallace, figured on taking that route to Boise for the session even before the slides because he was taking a truckload of household goods.

Goedde also believes the Legislature should reconsider rerouting U.S. 95 from Council from Emmett, the so-called Indian Valley route.

That would prevent the state from having to fight with environmentalists over widening U.S. 95 along the Weiser River or Idaho Highway 55 along the North Fork of the Payette river, Goedde said. It’s also a more direct route for truckers.

A 1985 study estimated this route would cost $35 million to build.

Reconstruction and rerouting aside, the most immediate question for most people is when U.S. 95 will open.

There is no estimate.

For the moment, the Idaho Department of Transportation is concentrating on opening one lane to emergency traffic and local traffic. Even that may be difficult.

Some slides can’t even be sized up because they are blocked by other slides.

, DataTimes