It may be Western Pennsylvania's longest-running public project. But the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission's double combo, the Mon-Fayette Expressway and the Southern Beltway, may never be completed.

That's a shame because the 110 miles of highway would provide quick access between Pittsburgh and the Mon Valley, an express route around the Squirrel Hill Tunnel and a fast link between the airport and points south. But the cost, about $5 billion, may have proved too high and the time line too long. Now there is no certainty that the state will ever have in hand the $3.6 billion needed to finish the job.

What Pennsylvania has to show for its effort and its $1.4 billion are proposed segments in various preliminary stages of planning and two stretches of highway that have some utility, though they fall short of their original promise.

The six-mile Findlay Connector is a time-saver for Route 22 travelers to the airport and would become part of the Southern Beltway. Nearly 60 miles of the Mon-Fayette Expressway is paved, from Route 51 in Jefferson Hills almost to Interstate 68 in West Virginia.

No one has been more frustrated by the Legislature's inability to secure full and final funding, 34 years after the Mon-Fayette's ground-breaking, than turnpike CEO Joe Brimmeier. He called on the General Assembly late last year to give a clear signal as to whether he should complete or cancel the plans. Its response could not have been muddier.

Faced with a transportation funding crisis on bridge and road repair and mass transit, the Legislature approved an unusual route to get money by floating bonds that will be paid off by slapping tolls on Interstate 80. There was no dedicated funding stream for the Mon-Fayette or the Southern Beltway.

Even so, the turnpike will announce the good news today that it has $480 million in hand to move both projects forward. The biggest boost will be the $450 million that will be spent to complete a missing eight-mile stretch of the Mon-Fayette Expressway between Brownsville and Uniontown. Once that's finished in 2011, along with 4.2 miles under construction by the state of West Virginia, the new toll road will run an uninterrupted 60 miles.

The remaining $30 million will be used for final design work and property acquisition on a 13-mile leg of the Southern Beltway between Route 22 and Interstate 79. That will lift a cloud from the heads of property owners who live along the border between Washington and Allegheny counties, the proposed highway's path. They have been trapped by the uncertainty of project completion; a buyout from the turnpike will give them a free pass out of limbo.

That same sense of doubt looms large over communities that would bear parts of the northern leg of the Mon-Fayette Expressway: Hazelwood, Braddock, Turtle Creek and others. That's why a decision and a commitment are still needed on whether this massive project will be completed.

Although there was no funding for these plans in the transportation budget, there is hope at the turnpike for a new funding source. No one knows, for instance, exactly how much revenue will be generated by I-80's tolls. Also, the governor's short-lived appeal for private entities to lease the turnpike may have unwittingly stirred interest in a public-private partnership that could complete these highways.

Still, the public's patience is wearing thin. While Pennsylvanians in the path of these plans are glad to see some movement, they're a long way from the finish line. It's time to find the funding or lay these concrete dreams to rest.