In fall 1968, a meeting was held in Hollidaysburg dealing with the proposed construction of a new four lane, limited-access Route 22 eastward past Blair’s county seat community, past Williamsburg Borough and into Huntingdon County.

The project made sense then and it still makes sense, both from the stand- point of travel efficiency and potential economic development.

But Pennsylvania’s Department of Transportation made a big — some people would still judge it stupid — decision to opt for a construction corridor that would have bisected the Hollidaysburg Area School District complex.

Keep in mind that PennDOT had a number of other corridor options at that time, perhaps not as straight-line and deemed a bit more expensive than the school corridor, but the state transportation agency was living within an attitude emanating from Harrisburg: “Once we get the highways around Philadelphia, Harrisburg and Pittsburgh built, it will be your turn to get the modern highways that you need.”

But when that time came, funding began to become more scarce.

However, back to Route 22 east: At the meeting in Hollidaysburg on that fall evening in 1968, an inordinate amount of time was spent on the boring-to-the-public’s information about the technical aspects of the proposed project, not to what the many people in attendance wanted to talk about — the controversial “bisecting” option. A person in the crowd finally chose not to wait any longer and broke into a speaker’s comments.

The intense opposition to the “bisect option” and the potential for prolonged legal wrangling eventually killed “New Route 22 east” when PennDOT had viable alternatives that could have been built in the first place at increased price tags that today seem minuscule.

For anyone too young to be knowledgeable about Route 22’s Blair County history, that is why “old” Route 22 here never became “new” Route 22 and, dare we note, that the prolonged effort on that particular evening to limit the public’s voice only angered the public more and made residents ever more determined to block the project — and they did.

Why all the talk about Route 22 amid the controversial issue of Blair County commissioners’ proposed eminent domain action on behalf of a new county prison and, at least partially, at the expense of Alto-Reste Park cemetery?

Here’s the relevancy: In 1968, for a long time, the public’s opinion was ignored. Regarding Alto-Reste, the county commissioners respectfully listened to those who oppose taking the cemetery land in question and postponed — at least until April 3 — a vote on the issue.

But the growing eminent-domain opposition has exposed an unfortunate error on the commissioners’ part.

They’ve been so geared toward horizontal construction that they failed to consider vertical construction options that would require much less land — and, we’ve mentioned this before — similar to what Butler County accomplished when it built a new, very workable and efficient vertical prison structure.

Obviously, there would be a cost to obtaining vertical options, but one of that character might save money for the county in the end.

Meanwhile, it is refreshing that Blair’s state lawmakers have become interested in the issue and that one, Rep. Lou Schmitt, intends to introduce a bill that would exclude unused cemetery grounds from eminent domain proceedings — although, even if successful, that bill could not be applied to Alto-Reste.

Blair’s commissioners must be careful. They must not allow the prison project to end up like Route 22 east.

— Altoona Mirror