Many solutions have been proposed over the years to ease Parkway East congestion around the bottleneck created by the Squirrel Hill Tunnel.

The proposals have covered ordinary ideas like building another tunnel, cutting away the hillside and banning trucks at rush hours.

And they have included highly unusual ones like installing "pace lights" inside the tunnel and erecting tent-like optical illusions called "tunnel funnels," both intended to prod motorists into maintaining their speed instead of hitting the brakes at the tunnel entrances.

Now the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission has a plan: Build elevated toll lanes over part of the Parkway East between Downtown and Monroeville.

"It's an idea, that's all," turnpike commission Chief Executive Officer Joe Brimmeier said. "I threw it out there for its potential to get something done very quickly to bypass [the ground-level congestion at] the Squirrel Hill Tunnel. PennDOT already owns the right of way and we would find a way to tie it into the Mon-Fayette Expressway."

The idea caught PennDOT and others by surprise.

"Frankly, [Transportation Secretary Al Biehler] knows nothing about it," state Department of Transportation spokesman Rich Kirkpatrick said. "He plans to ask Mr. Brimmeier about it."

Mr. Biehler is one of five members of the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission. When the commission meets Tuesday, Mr. Brimmeier said he may ask for authorization to explore double-decking part of the Parkway East and determining if private investment firms may be interested in financing such an endeavor as part of a public-private partnership.

He got the idea from the Tampa-Hillsborough (Fla.) Expressway Authority whose 15 miles of toll road include six miles of elevated lanes opened two years ago. The lanes sit on T-shaped columns over the Crosstown Highway. They were designed to reduce congestion and increase capacity for trips in the Tampa Bay area.

Mr. Brimmeier said building toll lanes above the Parkway East could be an option to building a bypass as part of the 24-mile, Y-shaped northern end of the Mon-Fayette Expressway, thereby avoiding costly, disruptive construction through the Turtle Creek Valley to Monroeville. No engineering studies have been done yet to determine whether the proposal would require the highway to go through, over or around the hillside at the Squirrel Hill Tunnel.

The turnpike commission is in the middle of final design for the section, but officials have repeatedly said they don't have the estimated $3.6 billion necessary for property acquisition, railroad and utility relocations, and, finally, construction from Route 51 in Jefferson Hills north to the Parkway East and Downtown.

"If there's a better way to do it, why not?" Mr. Brimmeier said. "People need to be creative."

State Rep. Rick Geist, R-Blair, the ranking Republican on the House Transportation Committee, thinks the elevated lane or lanes over the Parkway East "make a lot of sense as a public-private partnership."

But he said he'd prefer having the state Transportation Commission -- rather than the turnpike commission -- handle the talks with a private firm that presumably would build the elevated lanes and collect the tolls.

The Parkway East "isn't even part of the turnpike commission's charter," he said, referring to the roads that are its responsibility, such as the east-west mainline and Northeast Extension of the turnpike.

The turnpike commission's scope of responsibility could be changed, however, by General Assembly action, he added.

The Pennsylvania Transportation Commission is a 15-member panel made up of legislators and gubernatorial appointees, and headed by Mr. Biehler.

Mr. Geist said elevated lanes would likely use "time-of-day pricing," meaning a charge of, perhaps, $5 during the busy morning and afternoon rush hours, but lower during nonpeak hours. Drivers would have the choice of paying to drive in a less-congested elevated lane or the usual bumper-to-bumper free lanes on the ground.

The cash toll on the elevated section of the toll road in Florida is $1.75 for cars.

Two other legislators, Reps. Nick Kotik, D-Robinson, and Tom Petrone, D-Crafton Heights, were shocked by the idea of elevated toll lanes.

"It's far-fetched. It boggles my mind," said Mr. Petrone. "What would be the cost per mile to build it? Ten million a mile?"

"My first reaction was skeptical," said Mr. Kotik. "In theory, it sounds nice, but where would the money come from to fund this? We have projects that have been on the books for years."

Turnpike commission considers elevated bypass