Public needs more access to the lake
1. 41-vehicle wreck ties up traffic Sunday on I-81 in Rockbridge County
2. Virginia Tech football roster has holes on picture day
3. Medicare penalties hit hospitals in Roanoke, New River Valleys
4. Microfestivus beer event gets downtown Roanoke hopping
5. McFarling: 2 little numbers are a big hurdle for Virginia Tech football
6. Arrest made in case of missing Nelson County teen
7. DAN CASEY: Copter cost still stirring up dust
8. Roanoke farmers markets making local foods more accessible
9. Virginia attorney general's office grows under Ken Cuccinelli
10. Man's drowning is 5th in Lynchburg area
Saturday, July 27, 2013
Public needs more access to the lake
The public is being shut out at Smith Mountain Lake. This is a public, not a private, lake. The Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries’ public ramps on the lake are not adequate to accommodate the number of boaters on the weekends.
AEP has donated approximately 10 acres of land for a new public-use boat landing in the Moneta area of Franklin County.
This facility is very much needed. AEP is prepared to begin construction this fall, with completion of the Oak Grove Boating Access Facility in the spring of 2014.
Franklin County has advised that this project does not need a rezoning, as the property falls within the company’s hydroelectric project boundary and will be maintained by the VDGIF.
Smith Mountain Lake is a public lake and should be enjoyed by all, not just a few. Boaters bring a lot of revenue into the counties surrounding the lake.
I encourage concerned boaters to contact the Franklin County Board of Supervisors with your concerns for public access on Smith Mountain Lake. This facility is way past due.
RICKY HUTCHISON
ROANOKE
The Cold War was a tag-team victory
Joe Davidson’s letter (“Reagan’s challenge gave more than hope,” July 25) seeking to credit President Ronald Reagan with our Cold War victory is historical bilge water of the first order and begs for rebuttal.
Leaving aside why we should credit anyone with the defeat of a system conservatives were the first to pronounce doomed by its own illogic, Davidson seems not to appreciate that George Kenan’s policy of containment was followed, firmly, patiently and with bipartisan congressional support, by Presidents Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Ford, Carter and Reagan himself.
Sure, Reagan made the last shot of the game, and perhaps it was a gutsy three-pointer, but how often does that make you MVP?
If, as Davidson asserts, the Marshall Plan, the Berlin Airlift and the blockade of Cuba represented “defeatism, floundering and waffling,” I say let’s have as much of these sterling characteristics in our foreign policy as possible.
PAUL METZ
BLACKSBURG
1. 41-vehicle wreck ties up traffic Sunday on I-81 in Rockbridge County
2. Virginia Tech football roster has holes on picture day
3. Medicare penalties hit hospitals in Roanoke, New River Valleys
4. Microfestivus beer event gets downtown Roanoke hopping
5. McFarling: 2 little numbers are a big hurdle for Virginia Tech football
6. Arrest made in case of missing Nelson County teen
7. DAN CASEY: Copter cost still stirring up dust
8. Roanoke farmers markets making local foods more accessible
9. Virginia attorney general's office grows under Ken Cuccinelli
10. Man's drowning is 5th in Lynchburg area
THE ROANOKE TIMES
