Went up to Snowshoe this weekend to do some fly fishing. There was still some snow (nothing close to skiable) on the WT and at the top of the basin.

It looked real weird to see Spruce Lodge gone. I wonder how many years it will be until Shavers is torn down? I'd guess 2.

Also wanted to add that one of the curved spans on Corridor H looks to have all the girders in place. The other one looked like it was missing the last two westbound girders. I'm not sure, but I think this progress from when I was last up in February when I could have sworn that neither span had complete girders.

Its seems a -really- long time until winter 05-06 but this has brightened my spirits; Look at the estimated completion date. ... http://www.wvcorridorh.com/route/map8.html ...

bawalker ... have you made any trips out that way to see if they are really on track to open the section this year? Maybe we should have an ongoing thread entitled 'Current Corridor H Status'?

I looked at that right after I posted. I hope it is soon. I'm planning on going up and fly fishing at least once more this summer and would love to shave a few more minutes (probably about 10?) off the trip.

Of course if you read all the links for construction they haven't even started the design of a couple sections yet.

Actually the time savings may be closer to 20 mins. The new section is 7 miles in length while the old route is appx 15 miles of switchbacks and takes around 25-30 mins.

More Corridor H opening this summer! Save 25 minutes.
Great News!!!
MadMonk..By the way, what did you catch, size and how many?
The Colonel

It was my first weekend fly fishing. All I caught was about a 10 inch small mouth. My buddy who has been fly fishing for about 15 years caught several rainbow and browns; a couple around 16 inches or so. I'm going to practice on the Gunpowder a few more times and then head back up this summer as I really enjoyed it.

I hate to be the spoilsport, but living here just miles away from Corridor H and driving past it at least twice a day, there is a snowball's chance in haties that the Baker -> Wardensville section will be open this summer. As MadMonk did notice, the east bounder girders are 95% in place. (Just a note these bridges are using 4 girders per width of the bridge and each girder is 12' tall.) But at the moment the western abutment of the eastbound lanes isn't completed so the girders are stopping just short of spanning the entire length while the westbound bridge girders are around 60-70% complete.

As for more news on CorridorH... look for a frontpage DCSki.com article in the coming weeks. Scott has given me a go-ahead to create a series that he'll post on the main site. Once my explorer gets fixed this week I plan to drive out and get more updated pictures.

Will it open in time for ski season at least? Driving the curves on a nice warm day w/ dry pavement isn't that bad, but when it's snowing it gets tiresome after a bit.

In my personal opinion, I don't think it will. It seems like there is only a handful of crew members working on the McCauley bridges and they are already a year behind schedule. Once the girders get installed, they then have to have guys go across the top installing heavy metal rippled panels between the girders. Those will be what supports the concrete roadway. So they have to install those and seal those into place. Afterwards they then have to meticously (sp) install tons of rebar steel reenforcement bars before pouring the concrete.

If it says anything, last year at this time the Lost River Sinks bridges were just getting their girders finished and a year later they still aren't done.

Sadly it looks like another winter of driving the old roadway.

That sucks. I know that in some ways island time and mountain time are about the same, but sheesh that is some mighty slow construction.

BAWalker,
I was looking at the April 2005 Construction update info on http://www.wvcorridorh.com/engineer/0405_construction.html. For some reasons, I could not recall where Lost River Bridge #3 or #1 is located at. I know Lost River Bridge #2 is located at McCauley area.

Could you tell me where are those bridge nbr 3 and nbr 1 located at? Is the Lost River Bridge #1 located near Corridor-H Baker exchange area?

Bridge #3 is the Lost River Sinks bridge which crosses lost river. Bridge #1 is the bridge just beyond the Baker/Rt 55 interchange which also crosses lost river.