Through its Stop I-3 project, WaysSouth continues to work with our contact at the Federal Highway Administration. The administration says that the study is now a “top priority.” The money is still available and will remain so unless rescinded. Many thanks to those of you who responded to our action alert and wrote to Dr. Orszag in the Office of Management and Budget asking for the money to be rescinded. If you have not had a chance to write, visit http://www.stopi3.org/actionalerts.php for more background and instructions.

In our Corridor K North Carolina project, we are continuing to raise awareness in Graham County, N.C., about the ad-vantages of alternative transportation improvements to Highway 74, which do not involve a new interstate grade four-lane road that ruins the magnificent vistas of this part of Western North Carolina and interferes with the quiet and solitude of the Appalachian Trail. As proposed in the draft study, the 10-mile $378 million segment would require a half-mile tunnel and would not shorten travel time ascompared to existing routes. Click here to read the letter that WaysSouth, along with 16 other organizations, wrote to the North Carolina Department of Transportation requesting public input sessions. We currently anticipate two sessions (Robbinsville and Sylva) in late 2009 or early 2010. See “The Road Less Traveled” below to read an inspiring and informative article about

Corridor K in North Carolina by Wally Smith. If you know people in Graham County, please share this information with them. If appropriate, we would like to talk with them directly.

Our work on Corridor K in the Ocoee Gorge area of Tennessee comes much earlier in the planning process than in North Carolina. The current study of this area is just getting started. Betty Petty of the WaysSouth Board is serving on the Tennessee Department of Trans-portation’s citizen resource team and Holly Demuth, executive director of WaysSouth, is serving on the economic, environmental, and utilities leadership team. As we begin to be involved at the early stages of studies, WaysSouth is further realizing our potential to affect transportation in the region.

As we readied this issue of our newsletter,
WaysSouth’s board had begun to undertake the development of an updated strategic plan. As a young organization, WaysSouth must continue to analyze what we have accomplished and identify
creative ways to achieve our mission as advocates for responsible transportation in Southern Appalachia. Once we have completed our strategic plan, we will share the results with you – donors, volunteers and supporting organizations.

Thank you for continuing to support as we move ahead.

Profile of
a New WaysSouth Director

Betty Petty is passionate about hiking the Tennessee mountains and doesn’t hesitate to put her passion into action to protect those mountains. Although she is one of the newest directors on the WaysSouth Board, Petty comes as a seasoned grassroots activist. She is deeply involved in citizen efforts to ensure that wise and rational decisions are made in planning routes for the Corridor K highway through Tennessee.

In 2002, Petty retired from the Tennessee Valley Authority in Chattanooga, where she worked as a computer programmer/ analyst.

groups, Petty explained, “Stop I-3 and Corridor K share a common cause. By uniting our efforts, we are stronger in voice and resources.” She further described how one of the Corridor K highway routes being considered would cross the Benton MacKaye Trail multiple times. “We don’t think this is wise or needed,” said Petty.

Speaking of her role on the
WaysSouth board of directors, Petty said: “I ensure that Corridor K concerns are coordinated and that the board is kept informed on highway
initiatives and opinions in
Tennessee.”

WaysSouth has long prided itself in being a lean and nimble organization. In tough financial times, however, that does not
give much room to tighten our belt on expenses. Our “fuel” is precariouslylow,
and we are asking you to please make a donation to support our work today.

The current economic downtown is affecting all nonprofits, with small, young nonprofits like
WaysSouth particularly hard hit. We have been fortunate to earn the support of several area foundations. This year, however, these supporters have less to
give. Several previous
WaysSouth funders are either not accepting any grant proposals right now or have asked us to reapply later.

The board of directors is working diligently to bring in revenue to make sure we can continue our programs with current
staffing levels. After our strategic planning retreat, we are aware more than ever of the need to fill the void of advocating for responsible transportation in Southern Appalachia.

Many of you have already
donated this year to WaysSouth, and we are deeply grateful to those of you who have supported our efforts during these challenging times. Many thanks to those supporters listed below who gave in the last quarter. If you can find space in your budget for an “extra mile” dona-
tion, it would be most helpful at this critical time. Click here to donate.

Another exciting tool has been added to WaysSouth's outreach arsenal – Facebook! You can become a Facebook “fan” of WaysSouth or make donations securely through our new
Facebook Cause.Our pages offer you an exciting way to connect with other WaysSouth users, post your pictures and thoughts about Southern Appalachian transportation issues,
and support our efforts.We hope you'll search for WaysSouth on Facebook, join the fun and become a fan.Visit our page . You can donate to WaysSouth here.

Every six years, Congress sets the country's transportation and infrastructure priorities — allocating hundreds of billions of dollars for projects that shape our communities for generations. The implications of the federal transportation bill, from the priorities set to specific earmarks, have a profound effect on Southern Appalachia. Interstate 3 was an earmark in the 2005 bill.

As you are aware from the recent WaysSouth action alert regarding the federal transportation bill, we are partnering with the national trans-portation coalition Transportation For America to add our voice in this important piece of legislation.

Transportation For America is the nation's most diverse coalition of organizations and elected officials working towards reform of the federal transportation bill. The coalition comprises leaders in various sectors, including those who focus on health, housing, development, business, equity, government, labor, older Americans, the environment, rural and urban areas and more. We are all

working to ensure that the upcoming trans-portation bill gives us more mobility options besides driving, while simultaneously achieving other national goals. Smart transportation investments can improve our quality of life, increase our energy security, boost our local economies, improve our health, protect our environment and create jobs and ensure access to jobs, goods and services for all Americans, including older citizens, children, low-income residents, and people in small cities, towns and rural regions.

To learn more about the work Transportation For America is doing, their national trans-portation vision and their blueprint for getting there, go to www.T4America.org.

So what’s all the excitement
about Corridor K? a neighbor
asked me.

The issues that join WaysSouth and Corridor K at the hip stir emotions and may appear complex. Volunteer Wally
Smith recently wrote an article for the Natural Resources Defense Council’s online publication, “OnEarth,” that captures the salient Corridor K issues in a clear and inspirational way. To better understand why WaysSouth is engaged with Corridor K in North Carolina, read this excerpt and check out the link below to read the full article.

Editor

The Road Less Traveled
April 6, 2009, OnEarth.org,
Wally Smith

Stecoah Gap sits, at 3,165 feet, in a high saddle in western North Carolina's Cheoah Mountains. It's a quiet place - a
weatherbeaten, two-lane state highway crosses the mountains in the gap, amid a thick tangle of hardwoods, wildflowers, and the white-blazed footpath of the
Appalachian Trail. Black bears lumber across the road from time to time. Brightly-colored salamanders scuttle underfoot.

But Stecoah Gap is getting attention not for what lives in its forests and nearby coves, but for what lies beneath. Last year, the North Carolina Department of Transportation released its plans to drill a 2,870-foot long tunnel almost 500 feet below Stecoah Gap, as part of a project aimed at building a mostly four-laned highway across the southern Appalachian highlands of North Carolina and Tennessee.

Deemed Corridor K, the road-building project is part of the larger Appalachian Regional Commission's Appalachian
Development Highway Program, authorized by Congress in 1965 to build modernized highway systems through-out the Appalachian Region. The ARC's highway system stretches from New York to Mississippi, and its component roads (or 'corridors') are named with letters from A to X. [Click here to read the full article.]

Attention Bikers and Bicycle Riders

Riding a bicycle or motor scooter on freeways and interstates is against the law. It’s also no fun and dangerous for both cyclists and motorists. Everyone benefits by having byways and back roads that are accessible and safe when shared by cars, trucks and bikes of all types. WaysSouth is dedicated to preserving our scenic byways and railways. We unders-tand the need for these modes of travel for recreation and commerce.

For those of us on two wheels, the need to preserve our byways is more acute. They are not merely our means to get TO recreation, they ARE our recreation!

Volunteers are needed to reach out to this huge two-wheel community about WaysSouth. If we can show bikers what we are fighting for and why, they will understand how vital it is for them to have their voices heard.

Please contact me for more information and to help coordinate these goals.

Ride (and drive) safe,
Richard St. John
770-906-0899

What role does rail play in developing sustainable and responsible trans-portation solutions for the Southern Appalachians? That is the question that some 10 volunteers for WaysSouth are working to answer. Led by Bob Grove of Brasstown, N.C., who also serves on the Corridor K task force, WaysSouth’s rail task force has spent the past year developing a scope of work and conducting research to determine whether improved rail infra-structure using existing rights of way might take the place of a new four-lane highway through the mountains that would destroy thousands of acres of national forest.

With population density being low in the region, and since organizations and individuals calling for the construction of a four-laned Corridor K claim that a new road is necessary to move freight through the region, the task force has concentrated on the movement of goods rather than on passenger rail. The members of the rail task force have inventoried rail assets in the region. At one time, rail lines criss-crossed the region, and many of the tracks are still there, although in disrepair. Recent research by the Appalachian Regional Commission makes a strong case that supports what WaysSouth has been saying: that the future of commercial transportation is with rail and not trucking. The ARC makes the case that trucking should be seen only as viable transport at the beginning and end of commercial transport. Furthermore, the way to provide for future commercial transport is to build the rail infrastructure starting with

the main lines and regional lines and then rejuvenating the local lines, which have fallen into disrepair and disuse.

Rail hubs would tie together the main, regional and local lines and provide efficient transfer between these lines. While it is possible to draw a line between Chattanooga and Asheville using railroad rights of way, rejuvenating local lines on both sides of the mountains and tying them together through rail hubs to the regional and main lines is likely to be more effective for promoting rail transport than the more difficult job of making a major rail connection across the mountains. The fact that there is a restorable line going across the mountains would add additional flexibility and provide an option for passenger rail, but it is not likely to be the main commercial transport route. Tying local lines into a robust rail network would also address the real future need of commercial transport identified in the ARC Corridor K economic study, which is to provide an effective infrastructure for linking the com-munities into the global market without the damage to both community character and the environment that a four-lane highway would create.

The task force is currently developing a fact sheet that supports the use of rail to handle freight traffic and preparing materials for the WaysSouth Web site that support the rail alternative.