I figured I'd take a moment to update everyone on the quiet scene of Corridor-H. Since the Wardensville to Moorefield section opened in it's entirety last October, there hasn't been much to talk about.
I will say that after a year has almost passed and have driven the highway probably 20 out of every 30 days a month. Not that I was surprised about anything on or regarding the highway because I had my private access to it before hand too.
Anyway the two things that stand out to me happen mostly during winter. First being the enormous crosswinds that can affect driving going from Wardensville to Baker. I encourage drivers to take it much slower in nasty weather in those portions.
Secondly is the McCauley bridges. While we already know they are on a banked 90* curve with a slight incline, these bridges in nasty weather are even NASTIER. I drove home from Moorefield back in February after a ice/snowstorm hit the area. While I had not slid or spun anywhere else on CH, I found my car wanting to slide on those bridges. In fact the slower I went, the more my car wanted to slide sideways towards the barrier. I had to work the gas pedal like a NASCAR driver just right to maintain perfect speed to make it through. Again, be careful.
Back to the new construction. Many of you may not have seen but this past week at the Rt 220/CH intersection, construction crews begun adding the tops to the piers which will span the floodplain and the South Branch River. All of the piers themselves seem to be nearly finished but the tops that support the steel girders are now being worked on. All other phase 1 earth moving on the other side of the river seems to be done also. I can't speak for more construction than that, other than to say that I plan to take some free time to do some investigating.
When this section of highway from Moorefield to Foreman is complete, this *WILL* alter our driving to CH to pretty much redirect us from going the Seneca route to the Scherr route. This is because when the highway ends in Foreman, drivers will have to make a left/southerly turn onto "Patterson Creek Road" and drive an estimated 10-15 minutes to where Patterson Creek Road ends at Rt 42 just north of Petersburg. From there it'll be shorter to drive to Scherr/Bismark/Davis/Canaan than going back down to Seneca and add all that back tracking in.
I hope to have some pictures soon of this new second in progress.
Brad
