by

Heinz Stucki

In the nineteenth century, the villages of southern Tuscarawas County flowered as commercial centers on the Ohio Canal.  The Port Washington Road connected Millersburg to the Ohio Canal at Port Washington.  Completed in 1832, the road carried agricultural products to the Ohio Canal and to the markets in the East and New Orleans.  In the twenty-first century, southern Tuscarawas County is poised to flourish again. 

The CIC is a partner in the effort to improve road access to the region from Pittsburgh, Columbus, and Sandusky.  Routes 250, 36, and 22 have achieved designation as a “macro corridor.”   Designations are important.  The Port Washington Road’s designation as Ohio’s first state road meant that money was available for its construction and maintenance from the federal “Three Percent Fund” which allocated three percent of the proceeds from the sale of public lands to road construction.  Today, the macro corridor designation means that the project has progressed from an “if” to a “when.” 

But southern Tuscarawas County has much more going for it.  Tourists are drawn to the area by attractions such as the Dennison Depot, Gnadenhutten and Newcomerstown’s Temperance Tavern Museum.  Dennison and Newcomerstown have full-featured industrial parks to attract employers seeking a location to “live well and work smart.”  The CIC collaborated with the Governor’s Office of Appalachia in recording 360-degree panoramic images of the Dennison and Newcomerstown industrial parks and of the Dennison Depot and Gnadenhutten historical site.  If you haven’t already done so, check them out on the web at www.appalachianohio.com.

The CIC has assembled the premier site for the FutureGen hydrogen-from-coal demonstration project in Ohio.  The 890-acre site is located between Port Washington and Gnadenhutten.  It has the requisite geology and it has good access to water, rail, roads, and the electric transmission grid.  Competition from other states, especially Texas, is intense, but with an aggressive campaign by the State of Ohio, our chances of securing the project are very real.        

Finally, major fiber optic lines, the critical transportation infrastructure of the twenty-first century, run along the Panhandle Railroad.

A century and a half ago, the Port Washington Road was a success.  The area it served prospered and its population doubled within ten years.  With the initiatives that are in place, similar progress is again in the cards.