Posted on 03/23/2020 8:28:47 AM PDT by Hojczyk
Pennsylvania officials reopened over a dozen rest areas on a Thursday, heeding to calls from truckers who are working tirelessly to keep the country’s supply chains open amid the ongoing spread of the deadly Chinese coronavirus.
The Pennsylvania Department of Transportation reopened 13 of its 30 rest stops on a limited basis on the interstates and throughout the Pennsylvania Turnpike.
PennDOT spokeswoman Alexis Campbell said in a statement that the sites will have five portable toilets, though the services plazas will remain closed due to a lack of cleaning staff.
The Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission reopened all 17 of its service plazas at 7 a.m. Friday, though on a limited basis.
Turnpike spokeswoman Rosanne Placey said it had closed down the plazas to give 7-Eleven and HMS Host an opportunity to prepare plans on how to keep the facilities clean while maintaining standard service.
“We realize how vital [truckers’] service is so we’re happy we can reopen even on a limited basis,” said Placey. “Even with this change, the food service will be open on a limited basis. We can’t have a lot of people there and they can’t eat inside.”
The development comes after one of the country’s largest trucking trade organizations criticized the closings, saying the stops are critical to drivers for, especially during the pandemic.
“We understand this decision was likely made in an effort to limit passenger vehicle movement, interaction among travelers, and the state’s administration and supervision of these facilities during an emergency declaration,” the Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association said in a statement on Tuesday. “However, rest areas are vitally important to truckers, who at this time are being heavily relied upon to transport critical supplies across the country.”
(Excerpt) Read more at breitbart.com ...
Who was the idiot that decided to close them in the first place? Truckers are our lifeline now.
the sites will have five portable toilets, though the services plazas will remain closed due to a lack of cleaning staff.
These people should be fired...no running water ...put the cleaning staff back to work..
Don’t want to “piss off” truckers who bring our food and other necessities to market.
How magnanimous of the fascists. They think they know what to close and what not to close. It’s one screw up after another.
Hopefully the PA turnpike police will stop writing speeding tickets for a bit too.
I think the idiot who ordered it is the governor of the state, a Dimocrapt party member.
“the sites will have five portable toilets”
It would be a fascinating study to check for the amount of virus in these portable toilets and the rate of infection of the drivers using them.
Being here in PA I can tell you that our turnpike is one of the most corrupt institutions in the world. There have been numerous prosecutions related to the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission.
Some porta potty guy was giving kickbacks for his services to PTC employees the detective in me suspects when they came up with this close the rest stops, install the outside potties scheme.
The idiot governor did it.
Truckers are saving our collective a$$e$!!!
I would go in the woods before i would use a porta potty.
“I would go in the woods before i would use a porta potty.”
You really don’t even want to park your truck down wind of them, to be honest.
So it’s OK for truckers to use the fetid, foul, unsanitary portable toilets and NO cleaning staff will show up to clean them?
So the state would rather the portable toilet companies put THEIR employees at risk of catching the disease than the STATE employees who clean the rest stops?
Are the people who govern Pennsylvania REALLY THAT stupid??
I thought it was the idiot governor?
A lot of these lifer politicians haven’t got a clue how the world actually functions. They likely didn’t consider truckers to be essential employees.
Just keep gay people out until the crisis is over.
Would be nice.
The chief idiot of course. The Governor.
They have got something worse than coronavirus - they are drunk on power. DeWine in Ohio is about to close the buds on the trees such is the level of his control freakery.
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