Why aren’t the Pennsylvania Turnpike and I-95 connected in Bucks County?

Well, Sleuth knows that when it comes to weird outcomes with public projects in this region the explanation often has to do with local opposition and a successful lawsuit.

Reader Steve Redden asks, perhaps inspired by the last Sleuth on the origins of the ‘Blue Route,’ why the Pennsylvania Turnpike has no interchange with Interstate 95 where the two highways cross paths in lower Bucks County.

Well, Sleuth knows that when it comes to weird outcomes with public projects in this region the explanation often has to do with local opposition and a successful lawsuit.

But if you guessed that here, you would be wrong.

Here’s the answer, from the Pennsylvania Turnpike’s own Web site on the long-discussed project to finally build the long-awaited interchange:

“1969: I-95 is completed through Bucks County. Original plan includes a full interchange between the PA Turnpike and I-95, but federal funds were not permitted to be used to connect an Interstate highway to a toll road, under federal laws and regulations of that period.  (The federal laws have since been modified to permit such a project.)”

Work on the interchange is now in the planning stages.

Susan Phillips of Newsworks/WHYY reported on the status last week.

Last year, Joel Rose did a report for NPR on the related, notorious gap in Interstate 95 in Mercer County, N.J.

Click here for that report.

Thanks again, Steve, for suggesting a local mystery to Sleuth.

If you have a mystery for Sleuth, ask it by clicking the link in the Sleuth box on the Sixth Square home page.