To the editor:

Not being part of the local power structure, I cannot for the life of me understand why so many powerful people who are usually so practical keep opposing a South Lawrence Trafficway route south of the Wakarusa River. I believe we’d have it built by now if they weren’t so insistent. The reasons given in letters like those of George Lauppe (Aug. 8) and Richard Smith (Aug. 16) just don’t make sense to me.

1. The Kansas Department of Transportation models showed four years ago neither route makes an appreciable difference to traffic on 23rd Street.

2. The cost difference between the routes is controversial, but in any case, it’s nothing as compared with the costs of delay and impasse.

3. The opponents seem to spend most of their time making angry complaints about how misguided the swamp lovers are. But so what? Practical people should just want to get the road built.

4. They say they are going to win the lawsuit. Even assuming they’re right, how much time will that all take?

5. They say a southern route would open up the southlands to development. My friends, the city’s comprehensive plan calls for putting 20,000 houses there within maybe 15 years. Aren’t all those houses going to need a southern SLT?

I can’t help wondering what the big deal is. Are some people’s real estate interests involved? The Journal-World really ought do some investigative reporting on this.

Walter Emerson,

Lawrence