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Planning staff and WVDOH flagged West Run Road as substandard; DSI thresholds explained
Summary
Planning staff and WVDOH told commissioners West Run Road is narrow, has crash hotspots and an undersized bridge; planning staff recommended denial unless improvements are provided, while planning office staff clarified development thresholds that trigger DOH access and DSI review.
County planning director Andrew Gaspar told the commission the section of West Run Road fronting the subject parcels is narrow (16–18 feet at points), lacks shoulders, has an undersized 16‑foot bridge and shows a high crash rate in county accident reports and MMPO/DOH data. "The roadway has been identified as currently substandard according to West Virginia DOH," he said, adding the crash data highlights the stretch between Saint Clair Hill and Stuartstown Road.
Staff noted an email from WVDOH (Michael Davis) saying commercial traffic could be problematic without infrastructure improvements. Planning office staff member Patricia Booth provided concrete thresholds for review: for residential, DSI thresholds begin around 12 units; for commercial, the threshold cited was 15,000 square feet of gross floor area. Booth said smaller land‑use permits can proceed at lower review levels but that DOH access approval and DSI review are required for larger projects.
Those clarifications shaped commissioners’ deliberations, with some expressing unease about adding traffic to a corridor they described as dangerous but acknowledging that DOH and later site‑plan reviews offer regulatory levers before construction.
