Back in June, The Gazette carried a Letter to the Editor wondering why I-270 is being repaved but Clopper Road through Germantown is only getting a quick patch job. It’s a fair question; after all, Clopper Road really is in dire need of some new pavement.
To the uninitiated, the answer would appear to be that Interstate 270 is maintained with federal highway funds while Clopper Road falls under county maintenance. The two separate agencies simply don’t have any connection with one another. The deeper answer however involves both Elvis and the fact that Clopper Road is just too curvy.
As you may have heard, The Weekly World News this week ceased publication of its print edition. (The online version will remain, at least for now.) The Weekly World News (WWN) has long been one of the last bastions of investigative journalism, covering such under-reported topics as the reports that not only had Fidel Castro been hospitalized, but that his doctors were Space Aliens and that “Bat Boy” (a half-human, half-bat found living in a cave) had been recruited to help seek out the cave Osama bin Laden is living in.
The decision to cease publication was first made known to the federal government some six months ago, and that’s why this summer has seen a spate of interstate highway construction projects on the East Coast.
Part of the lore of the interstate highway system is that when it was first being laid out, one of the requirements was that a minimum of one out of every three miles had to be straight. That way, in time of war, the interstate highways could also be used as emergency runways for jet fighters. If you’ve ever seen the Space Shuttle return from a mission, then you already know that jet planes aren’t the only things that need long, smooth-surfaced runways.
With the termination of the WWN‘s print edition, the interstates are going to be put into service as the newspapers’ editorial staff leaves the planet to go to their new assignments. And that’s why Clopper Road isn’t being repaved – it’s too curvy to be used as a runway.
The road construction is certainly inconvenient, but there is some good news. At the same time that the WWN‘s staff is leaving, Elvis will at long last be making his comeback tour.
Crossposted to Germantown Info.