Biz group says poll shows megaloads support

“Drive Our Economy,” a business group in Idaho and Montana that backs megaload shipments on U.S. Highway 12 in north-central Idaho, released a poll today that it says shows Idahoans back the megaloads too, including those who live near the route. “A similar poll was done in Montana that achieved similar results,” said Alex LaBeau, president of the Idaho Association of Commerce & Industry and co-chairman of the “Drive Our Economy” coalition. “This is a well thought-out plan in moving these shipments from the Port of Lewiston up through Montana. The public supports this. This is about driving the economy.”

Several lawmakers joined LaBeau at a press conference to release the poll, as did the manager of the Port of Lewiston. Sen. Chuck Winder, R-Boise, former chairman of the Idaho Transportation Board, said, “Think about what happens if people don’t want farm equipment moved, they don’t want a large manufactured home moved because it might interfere with their right to use the road. … You can’t hide behind ‘this is a scenic highway.’ … This is something I think we all need to get behind.”

New Senate Transportation Chairman Jim Hammond, R-Post Falls, was among those endorsing the plan, which includes hundreds of giant loads of oil equipment traveling the scenic, twisting two-lane route at night over the next year or more, en route to the Alberta oil sands project. He said he thinks it’s important to the nation’s energy future and to job creation. “I think it would be a real danger to our economic development, as we start to grow again, if we try to hinder any of these kinds of loads,” Hammond said. “Most people, particularly in this tough economy, know that we need to start rebuilding, and this project is just one niche of that rebuilding.”