Update on the Pocahontas ARC Broadband Project

Although there was no formal Pocahontas County Broadband Council meeting in August, Ruthanna Beezley sent out an update outlining the progress of Pocahontas County’s Appalachian Regional Commission (ARC) Broadband Project. When finally built, that project will provide internet broadband service roughly East out of Marlinton along route 39, then North on both Routes 28 and 92 to Dunmore.

Although the grant for this two and a half million-dollar project was awarded in 2021, project construction has yet to begin due to numerous administrative hurtles.

The current update is that the County’s Department of Highways required bond will soon be in place, after which the project’s engineering company -Thompson and Litton, will send the bond and a completed MM109 application to the WV Department of Highways District 8.

(Since, like you, we didn’t have any idea of just what an MM109 application is, we made an internet search which revealed that the MM109 application is a Right of Way Entry Permit Application which is required by the West Virginia Department of Highways for any encroachment on a public roadway such as adding a new driveway, or in this case, building fiber poles and lines.)

The included timeline anticipates that 30 days after submission of the MM109 application T&L should receive a response from District 8 and will address any of their concerns.

About 10 days after that T&L should receive the approved MM109 application back.

Once that is received, T&L will submit a request to the state for authorization to advertise for bids for the actual construction of the broadband fiber lines.

The update also included a construction cost estimate for the project which was compiled by T&L which is as follows:

• Aerial Fiber installation:  -$988,284
• Materials:                                                 -$588,000
• Pole Make Ready Allowance:  -$60,000
• Bonds, Taxes, Mobilization & Insurance: -$81,814

The estimated subtotal Construction cost is:                          $1,718,098

Construction Contingency (10%) is:                                            $171,810

Estimated total construction cost is:                                        $1,889,908

So folks, it looks like the project is actually progressing towards actual construction beginning in the coming months.