By JIMMY LAWTON and CRAIG FREILICH

A state Department of Transportation “rooftop highway” report that is the subject of criticism by some St. Lawrence County officials is still a draft and should not yet have been part of general public discussion, a spokesman for the Department of Transportation says.

The memorandum described by members of the Northern Corridor Transportation Group (NCTG) as “very confusing” and containing “data set errors” remains incomplete and was not intended to be complete, according to Beau Duffy, DOT director of communication.

Duffy’s comments were in response to a press release issued by longtime “rooftop highway” advocate Jason Clark in which NCTG criticized the DOT draft analysis of the proposed Potsdam-Canton bypass. Some view construction of a bypass as a more realistic alternative to building an interstate highway running between Watertown and Plattsburgh.

Duffy said the document was a draft technical memorandum, which consisted of an analysis of previous studies of the “rooftop highway” concept that had already been done. It was shared a recent meeting of the stakeholder’s advisory committee was intended to gather information that would be used to complete that technical memo, he said.

“The whole reason we shared the draft was so that we could gather input from the stakeholders before finalizing it,” he said.

However, the consultant who was to attend the meeting and collect information for further development was unable to make it due to weather conditions, so while the meeting went on, no conclusions were drawn.

“The draft document that was shared with the stakeholders was a draft. It was just one part of the larger study, it was not the entire study,” Duffy said.

“What they were doing was a reexamination of those earlier studies. The second part, which still has to be done, is the access study. That will take a look at the economic development aspect,” he said.

Duffy said he would not be able to release the draft, because it was incomplete.

“We don’t do that, because as you can see draft plans are often misconstrued,” he said.

But several local politicians who got an unauthorized look at the draft report were critical of the fact that the document did not focus on economic development, which they assumed would be part of the memo.

Jason Clark, spokesman for the Northern Corridor Transportation Group, which favors the “I-98” Watertown-to-Plattsburgh superhighway proposal, said that “the primary objective was to analyze the potential economic impact” of previous studies, and “from what we understood, when the committee met last year, the point was to focus on the bypass,” another plan that proposed building an adjunct to U.S. Rt. 11 around Canton and Potsdam, possibly as part of improvements to stretches of Rt. 11, as opposed to a major superhighway farther north.

When his colleagues did not see what they expected, they were confused and dismayed.

“It’s a very confusing document,” said Potsdam Village Trustee Steven Warr, according to the press release sent on behalf of the Northern Corridor Transportation Group by Clark, a former St. Lawrence County legislator from Norfolk.

Warr told Clark that there are other serious issues with the report. “There are data set errors between sections, the findings presented on one page are presented as different numbers on other pages, even the terminus location shuffles back and forth between Plattsburgh and Rouses Point. Some of the modeling assumptions are entirely unrealistic. It just makes no sense that the Department of Transportation would spend this kind of money on something so flawed.”

Potsdam Town Councilman James Grant, quoted by Clark, said, “the report fails to discuss economic development potential in any way. Nowhere does it even reference the possibility of expanded commerce via Canada. That was the whole point.”

But the DOT’s Duffy said that part of the study is yet to be written.

“This first technical memo should be finalized later this month, and we’ll hold a public information meeting early spring – probably late March,” Duffy said.

Duffy was not able to say with certainty when the rest of the study would be available.

“We hope to have the entire study completed by fall of this year,” he said.

Members of the North Country Access Improvements Canton-Potsdam Corridor Study Stakeholder Advisory Committee are representatives from local government, colleges and universities, the business community, the health care community and transportation advocacy groups. They were all invited to the recent meeting to discuss the draft.

Those members, many of whom, along with the consultant, missed the meeting because of the weather, are:

• David Acker, CEO, St. Lawrence Health System

• Larry Averill, Chairman, Town of Potsdam Planning Board

• Marylee Ballou, Executive Director, Potsdam Chamber of Commerce

• Don Chambers, St. Lawrence County Highway Superintendent

• Bill Dashnaw, former St. Lawrence County Highway Superintendent

• Wade Davis, Executive Director, Ogdensburg Bridge and Port Authority

• Ben Dixon, North Country Regional Economic Development Council / area college and university representative

• Scott Docteur, Director, NYSDOT Regional Planning and Program Management

• Ruth Doyle, Assistant St. Lawrence County Administrator

• Richard Grover, YESeleven representative

• Brien Hallahan, Superintendent, Village of Canton

• Brian Hammond, Vice Chair, Northern Corridor Transportation Group

• Frederick Hanss, Village of Potsdam Planning Board

• Sally Hill, Executive Director, Canton Chamber of Commerce

• Michelle James, Coordinator, St. Lawrence County Traffic Safety Board

• Michael Lecuyer, Director, St. Lawrence County Emergency Service

• Mike Morgan, Chairman, Town of Canton Planning Board

• Alan Ricalton, Assistant Director, NYSDOT Regional Planning and Program Management

• Brooke Rouse, Executive Director, St. Lawrence County Chamber of Commerce

• Dave Werner, Vice Chair, Franklin County Traffic Safety Board

• Keith Zimmerman, Director, St. Lawrence County Planning Office