Friday's ribbon-cutting ceremony for the Summit Intersection project focused the spotlight again on Butler County's good fortunes over the past seven years on the roadway construction and repair front.

Last November, a major accomplishment was scored with the opening of the Cranberry Connector project, which began to move forward in October 1997 when the state removed it from "hold" status. Although the connector opened a year ago, work on the project's final ramp was completed in June of this year, and that marked the official end of the project.

The county's transportation achievements story shifted Friday to Summit Township, where officials opened a project designed to end the high rate of death, injury and damage that was the former intersection's dubious claim to fame.

As with the connector project, the rebuilding of the Summit Intersection didn't come about easily. The connector intially was put on hold due to a purported shortage of funds on the state level, eventually producing a project scaled down in cost. In Summit, a former board of township supervisors, in a display of abject shortsightedness and lack of concern for the safety of the thousands of people passing through the intersection each day, blocked the project until one of the opposition majority was defeated for re-election.

Initially, the opposition majority expressed the bogus argument that the township couldn't afford to pay maintenance and energy costs associated with traffic signals and lighting at the new intersection. When those supervisors were unable to back up that argument with facts, they then turned to attacking the reconfiguration plan that the state Department of Transportation was proposing.

The turning point came in February 2002, when the new board of supervisors majority gave the project the go-ahead by agreeing to assume the traffic signals cost. That paved the way for Friday's ribbon-cutting, which realized a dream of county traffic-safety proponents extending back to the early 1980s.

The $11.2 million Summit project provides a number of safety improvements. They include improved ramp configurations, widening of two existing bridges, longer acceleration and deceleration lanes, and the formerly controversial traffic signals and highway lighting.

As is common with projects of that scope, the motoring public has been inconvenienced by delays and slow travel through the construction zone. But for the most part, drivers have been patient and courteous, realizing that the project was aimed at benefiting them for many years to come.

Beyond the commendable level of general highway maintenance the county has witnessed in recent years on the part of PennDOT, attention now shifts to construction of Butler's Main Street Viaduct replacement project - work that began this year - and the Wayne Street Viaduct replacement that is scheduled to begin once the new Main Street span is completed.

Meanwhile, the Route 228 reconstruction project is a major undertaking that remains in the planning stage.

Unfortunately, three major projects that could spawn significant economic revitalization to the City of Butler and the county as a whole seem beyond the scope of possibility for the foreseeable future, maybe for generations, maybe forever - because of limited new-highway construction funds available from the federal government and the county's limited transportation clout in Washington in regard to bold new ventures.

The ideas in question are a four-lane, limited-access Route 356 between Butler and Route 28; a four-lane, limited-access Route 68 between Butler and Cranberry; and a four-lane, limited-access Route 8 from Butler to Interstate 80. Those projects would make Butler County a magnet for industrial development because of the ease of bringing in raw materials, and moving finished products from plants and factories to markets in all directions.

However, there remains a rural mind-set in this county that would oppose such an influx, although future generations, preferring to remain in this part of the commonwealth, might view an extensive economic-development option, opened as a result of additional major highway upgrades, as the way to proceed.

Like Interstate 79 and improved portions of Route 422, the Cranberry Connector will always be viewed as a major player in the county's transportation network. The Summit Intersection, while smaller in scope, is important not only to motorists, but also to the township's ability to attract new enterprises in that area - the Morgan II office building is already in place to take advantage of the new conveniences that the rebuilt intersection offers.

Friday was an important day for Butler and Butler County. Leaders should work hard for more of them.

- J.R.K.