The federal government released the Final Environmental Impact Statement last week for public comment about the next section of the Southern Beltway.

The 13.3 miles of highway are to follow the Allegheny-Washington county line from Interstate 79 near Southpointe to Route 22, where it would connect with the soon-to-open Findlay Connector and Pittsburgh International Airport.

Combined, the two sections would remove a significant amount of traffic from I-79 north to the Parkway West and from the Parkway West through the airport corridor. Because the existing roads are becoming more congested, and because PennDOT doesn't have the intent or money to expand them, it appears to be a beneficial undertaking, unlike some other expenditures of public money.

But readers have been asking, does the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission have the money to build the I-79/Route 22 section?

No.

I got the latest figures last week.

Planning, preliminary engineering and environmental studies have cost $12 million.

Another $64 million is being held in escrow: $50 million for final engineering and design when the turnpike receives federal authorization to proceed and $14 million toward an estimated $24 million cost of buying rights of way through Cecil and Robinson and parts of Mount Pleasant and South Fayette.

That leaves the turnpike with a $10 million shortfall for property acquisition and a $593 million shortfall for the construction, chump change compared with the almost-unthinkable $3.5 billion needed to build the final 50 miles of the 100-mile Southern Beltway and Mon-Fayette Expressway system.

Where will the turnpike get the money?

Ask your lawmakers.

It was their colleagues who passed legislation in the 1980s that directed the toll-road agency to build the Greensburg Bypass, Beaver Valley Expressway, Mon-Fayette Expressway, Southern Beltway, a second Lehigh Tunnel and other projects.

Many of the ex-legislators who ordered the wish-list of toll road projects without providing sufficient means to pay for them are gone, collecting state pensions.

Construction will begin in February on a $20 million Residence Inn by Marriott, the second hotel to be built on the North Shore near future stations on the light-rail extension.

Consider the new office buildings, the 1,255-space parking garage, other planned development, existing businesses and attractions and plans to make the T a transfer point for North Hills buses. It looks as if Heinz Field and PNC Park ridership will be incidental by comparison.

Besides, hundreds of people with no other means of transportation have to get to the jobs at expanding North Shore facilities.

Some cheapskates think I'm a shill for the Port Authority on this $435 million project. They have no vision.

They still can't understand the federal money can't be spent on any other project or on the deficit-ridden operating budget, despite the fact that fares are to be increased and service is to be drastically cut.

Certainly the 1.2-mile North Shore Connector project will place added burden on the authority's operating expenses.

But if officials haven't figured out how to fund public transit and make it more efficient by the time the line opens five years from now, you might as well forget about the Port Authority altogether.

Standing tall. John F. "Fred" Graham Jr., of Mt. Lebanon, has been elected an honorary member of the American Society of Civil Engineers, a distinguished position only 544 people have attained in the national organization's 154-year history.

During a 20-year career with the Allegheny County Department of Engineering and Construction, he oversaw building Pittsburgh International Airport. He went to the Pennsylvania Turnpike as the chief engineer and deputy executive director in the 1990s. Then he formed a consulting business.

Mr. Graham has been an engineering disciple, dedicated to furthering his profession by participating in and leading various engineering and transportation organizations over the years.

He's head-and-shoulders above most of the other 544 engineers in the ASCE's hall of fame. He's 6 feet, 6 inches tall.

Elsewhere. People in 28 political jurisdictions in the Flint, Mich., area have renewed a property tax for public transit, with 72.6 percent voting in favor and 27.4 percent opposed to the 0.4-mill assessment.

Believe it. Ridership on U.S. public transit systems grew by 3.2 percent in the first half of the year, mostly in light-rail, up 8.5 percent.

Plate du jour. Lou Conley, of Sewickley, spotted the Pennsylvania personalized plate EEE GADS on a car tooling down Nicholson Road in Franklin Park.