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Simply put.... because WV is seen as too much old Union legacy in mining, most is Appalachia, lacks the huge Universities and pocket of educated professionals and WV may not give Corporate America the incentives like the Darling States that do give, and did I say..... it is not the Darling move too state of the South.
Why McConnell so widely known in politics and Congress also comes from a state that is not listed close to the top.... is always strange to me. All his power. Clearly, WV is not the priciest state or its cities by far.... the power to make or break a city and state is how well Corporate America uses it .... or how badly it abandons it.
West Virginia has a great foundational university, that is highly successful on a number of fronts. The problem is, the state has the most inefficient higher educational system in the country. It supports 10 teachers colleges, and numerous community colleges, each with their own individual bureaucracies. Compare that to Iowa or Pennsylvania and you get the idea of what is really happening. It is as though the state is intentionally locked into pork barrel politics that support the least efficient to the cost of what really works.
West Virginia has a great foundational university, that is highly successful on a number of fronts. The problem is, the state has the most inefficient higher educational system in the country. It supports 10 teachers colleges, and numerous community colleges, each with their own individual bureaucracies. Compare that to Iowa or Pennsylvania and you get the idea of what is really happening. It is as though the state is intentionally locked into pork barrel politics that support the least efficient to the cost of what really works.
This is the general theme of WV.
55 counties. CA with 20x the population has 58 counties. WV has 80,000+ miles of road. A bit less than NJ, more than MA and MD. The entire state of WV has less population than some of the cities in those states.
The amount of inefficiency (incompetence? Out right corruption??) at all levels of our state is something to behold.
Anecdotally, route 20 from I64 down to Hinton (population ? 10?) is nicer than any road in Monongalia County. Residents of Monongalia County should be issued a check by the state for damage caused by roads rather than charging us taxes to pay for the (lack of) road maintenance.
55 counties. CA with 20x the population has 58 counties. WV has 80,000+ miles of road. A bit less than NJ, more than MA and MD. The entire state of WV has less population than some of the cities in those states.
The amount of inefficiency (incompetence? Out right corruption??) at all levels of our state is something to behold.
Anecdotally, route 20 from I64 down to Hinton (population ? 10?) is nicer than any road in Monongalia County. Residents of Monongalia County should be issued a check by the state for damage caused by roads rather than charging us taxes to pay for the (lack of) road maintenance.
I tried, and failed, to find the land area of US states if "flattened out." I think the topography of WV is the main reason you need so many roads. The land area is probably much greater than those other states when elevation is taken into account, and the Allegheny/Cumberland plateau regions are a maze of hills and hollows that requires more roads to connect together than a flat place where you can build a grid.
Where the money is spent is a question I will leave to those of you more informed on the topic.
West Virginia has to start supporting its cities better or it will continue to die. Cities need more control over their own destiny and they need to be able to expand their borders. Compare the square mileage of most WV cities to that of other large cities and you’ll quickly see the disparity. The fear that some rural lawmakers express toward our cities doesn’t help the situation.
When it comes to roads, I think the residents of Mon County need to look at their district DOH headquarters in Fairmont rather than simply blaming Charleston. You don’t often hear people in Fairmont complaining about the roads there.
West Virginia has to start supporting its cities better or it will continue to die. Cities need more control over their own destiny and they need to be able to expand their borders. Compare the square mileage of most WV cities to that of other large cities and you’ll quickly see the disparity. The fear that some rural lawmakers express toward our cities doesn’t help the situation.
When it comes to roads, I think the residents of Mon County need to look at their district DOH headquarters in Fairmont rather than simply blaming Charleston. You don’t often hear people in Fairmont complaining about the roads there.
Agree with Tbailey on multiple fronts- the cities should be able to expand their borders via annexation. That's part of the reason many large cities in this country like Charlotte and Columbus are able to keep adding population at the rates they are.
Regarding Mon County roads- It's starting to sound like a former member has been reincarnated on here...Blame your local elected officials and DOH in Fairmont. Fairmont got that massive interchange to 'connect' its downtown when every other interchange already had a connection to downtown. Not that there's even much in downtown Fairmont to begin with. Then you have Clarksburg with its wide three lanes in each direction on 79 for traffic volumes that never appeared to me to warrant - at least compared to Morgantown.
Here's another view on WV's population decline. While it's an opinion article, Phil Kabler is spot on with most of his observations regarding the decline, along with providing some relevant sources.
YOUTUBEa lot of people hate this place
But in my eyes, its scenery is very like Japan
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