A biennial public hearing about funding road, bridge and transit projects in southwestern Pennsylvania could turn into a rally supporting the $3.6 billion northern section of the Mon-Fayette Expressway.

A dozen speakers, including local officials, have lined up to testify as a bloc Wednesday before the State Transportation Commission about completing the toll road in Allegheny County. County Chief Executive Dan Onorato and state Rep. Joe Markosek, D-Monroeville, chairman of the House Transportation Committee, are on the list.

They want to re-establish the importance of building the final 24 miles to Pittsburgh and Monroeville. Otherwise, when final design is finished about a year from now, a lack of funds could threaten one of the nation's biggest new highway construction programs after more than a decade of planning.

"To stop now is absolute insanity," said Chad Amond, president of the Monroeville Area Chamber of Commerce. He is also on the schedule to testify after the all-day session convenes at 8 a.m. Wednesday at the Hilton Garden Inn in Southpointe.

"Everybody needs to keep pressing so this project doesn't fall off the radar screen ... until there's a shovel in the ground," he said.

Mr. Amond blamed traffic congestion that impedes travel to Oakland, Downtown and Pittsburgh International Airport for companies leaving the Monroeville area, including GAI, US Steel Research, Verizon, Unison Healthcare and, recently, Westinghouse Electric Corp.

"Our status as one of the state's premier economic generators has slipped away," he said. "Westinghouse officials stated time and time again that the lack of an adequate transportation system in the east was a major factor in their decision to move" to Cranberry.

The 15-member State Transportation Commission holds statewide hearings every two years as part of updating the Transportation Improvement Program, a document that prioritizes projects and assigns billions of dollars of funding for them.

Wednesday's hearing covers 10 counties represented by the Southwestern Pennsylvania Commission, which also serves as the Metropolitan Planning Organization for Allegheny, Beaver, Butler, Armstrong, Westmoreland, Washington, Greene, Fayette, Indiana and Lawrence counties and Pittsburgh.

Mr. Markosek said no one expects the commission to identify or pledge funds for expressway construction. Not only is the estimated $3.6 billion price tag well beyond the reach of traditional revenues, but the state Legislature directed in the 1980s that the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission be responsible for building the expressway and a Southern Beltway as key elements of a toll road expansion program.

"The idea is to use the hearing as a forum to revitalize interest and re-educate people about how it can help the region over the long haul," he said. "We're at a seminal moment. Even though the expressway looks far off, it's obvious that if we don't maintain momentum, other than what has already been built, [we] will die off."

Last week, turnpike commission and state officials held a news conference in Fayette County, announcing plans to build an 8-mile link near Brownsville. When work is finished about four years from now, 60 continuous miles of the highway will be open from Interstate 68 east of Morgantown, W.Va., north to Route 51 in Jefferson Hills, where it currently ends.

The Y-shaped northern section would then become a missing link and fall short of why the project was undertaken in the first place, a combination of providing modern transportation in places where it's lacking and helping to revitalize old industrial Mon Valley towns.

Consultants have been working on the final design of the project since 2005. When the consultants were hired, turnpike engineer Frank Kempf said their goal would be to create a "model of urban freeways."

Mr. Onorato's spokesman, Kevin Evanto, said his boss endorses completion of the expressway as long as the project continues to provide access to "brownfield" sites the county is trying to develop, including Braddock, Hazelwood, Duquesne and Dravosburg-McKeesport.

"He'll also be saying [at the hearing] that everybody needs to look at different funding options, including public-private partnerships."

Joe Kirk, executive director of the Mon Valley Progress Council, which supports the project, agrees that a mix of public and private funding is needed to amass the billions needed to build a limited-access highway in an urban environment.

He is to provide the State Transportation Commission with "letters of interest" that the Progress Council has received from private firms with experience in financing and developing toll roads.

"From our conversations and meetings with these firms, one message came in loud and clear," Mr. Kirk said. "That is, we need enabling legislation to create public-private partnerships and an openness by our state Legislature to consider alternative ways to develop new highway projects."

Such legislation was proposed earlier this year but lawmakers have yet to act.

"We have to get elected officials to stop saying, 'I'm for this,' and get them to say, 'Here's what I'm going to do,' '' Mr. Kirk said. "They need to stand up ... to take some risks."

The public can still testify at Wednesday's hearing by calling 1-717-787-2913. Oral testimony is limited to five minutes.