Juneau debates if road will lead anywhere

The Boeing 737 plunges down through a blanket of drizzle in search of the runway that lies below two high, tree-topped ridges. No luck. Passengers sigh as the captain guns the engines and circles around for another try.

This time, bingo: a blanket of city lights pops into view, and the jet rolls into a low-level swoop toward the runway. Welcome to one of the most nerve-racking air approaches in the country. It is also one of the few ways to arrive in Juneau--the only state capital in North America you can’t get to by road, because there isn’t one.

Two hundred scheduled airline flights didn’t make it into Juneau last year, fodder for the long-running debate over whether the Legislature should head for the state’s population center--Anchorage.

No matter that 96% of the flights did land successfully, or that there’s pretty reliable ferry service, or that a sizable portion of residents aren’t even sure they want to make it easier for the world to come knocking: Juneau, land-locked too long, is thinking hard about a road.

An environmental impact study, making the rounds at public hearings this month, says a 65-mile highway could be punched through to Skagway. From there, it’s only 832 road miles to Anchorage, 710 to Fairbanks.

The proposal, which also looks at stepped-up, high-speed ferry service into Juneau, is drawing attention because it calls up all the old conflicts about what Alaska is and what people went looking for when they moved north.

A behemoth of a state whose grandeur is largely hidden away, Alaska has prided itself on the idea that those who succeed in getting somewhere do so by their own brawn, cunning or perseverance.

There is a word in Alaska for the lowest form of life on the planet: Winnebago.

That word pops up in the debate over whether the state Department of Transportation should build the two-lane, $232-million highway along the west side of Lynn Canal, as in how many Winnebagos could Juneau’s narrow, winding, one-way streets handle as new summer hordes flood in from points north.

“It’s kind of a two-edged sword,” admitted city manager Dave Palmer, whose city has done battle for years against ballot measures to move the capital to Anchorage. Twice, Alaska residents have voted to move the capital. Twice, Juneau and others have beaten the idea back. The city of 30,000 spends half a million dollars a year on free parking passes for state legislators, television broadcasts of legislative sessions and other efforts to keep the capital here.

A road, built largely with federal highway funds, would be a crowning achievement. Yet even Juneau officialdom is having doubts.

“You know, this is the only place we’d be having this discussion: Should we build a road to our town? But if it’s built, Juneau’s going to be the end of it,” Palmer said. “The question is, what are we going to do with all those buses and trailers and Winnebagos once they get here? “

On the other hand, city officials say, think of the commercial prospects of a road in a city that now has to barge in most of its heavy freight from Seattle. “If nothing else, as a species, we need to be able to get out of here,” said Fred Morino, head of Alaskans for Better Access, a pro-road group. “Have you ever heard of cabin fever? To be able to know that without a great expense, you can get in your car and go somewhere!”

Susan Ronsse says it’s often too expensive to fly the whole family out for a trip, and taking the ferry to Haines in the summer can require reservations months in advance. The 4 1/2-hour trip often leaves in the middle of the night.

On the other hand, say critics, driving would cut only about two hours off the ferry commute. For that, they say, motorists would have to pay a $25 toll and negotiate a road that will traverse 58 known avalanches, rendering it prone to frequent closures.

And the road, says the Southeast Alaska Conservation Council, would traverse pristine areas critical to the threatened Steller sea lion and other species.

“Even up here, we live in a car culture, and people somehow think it’s in the Constitution that you have to be able to get in your car and drive where you want, when you want,” said Joe Geldhof, a lawyer for the Marine Engineers’ Beneficial Assn., whose membership includes employees of the state ferry system. “This plan is unrealistic in its financial assumptions and reflects the kind of gung-ho, frontier spirit that sometimes gets us into trouble in this part of the world.”

State Rep. Norm Rokeberg, a west Anchorage Republican who has co-sponsored a bill this year to move the legislative sessions to Anchorage, says a road would help. ‘But is it enough?” he said. “The key issue of this whole thing is access of the vast majority of people to the legislative process.”