Pocono Record (Pennsylvania) - by Howard Frank

There are good ideas and bad ideas. And then there's plain old "Huh?"

The Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area is being awarded a $530,000 federal grant to reduce traffic congestion in the park.

It's a grant to "study and implement a 'regional alternative' shuttle service for park visitors."

Have you ever noticed congestion in the park?

Ever?

I haven't, unless of course you count cottontail rabbits, flying squirrels or the elusive wild turkey.

Relieving congestion in the park is like inventing a foot tanner — a solution in search of a problem.

The park service previously received a grant to operate a weekly seasonal shuttle service on the Pennsylvania side of the recreation area. Shuttle buses allowed visitors to load bicycles and other equipment for drop off and pick up at various locations.

Meanwhile though, the park service locked its bathrooms for the winter in October. It relies on its seasonal staff to clean and maintain 45 pit toilets at 24 locations.

"We didn't have the funding to maintain the staff. It was necessary to shut them down for the winter," a park service spokeswoman said.

Visitors to the 70,000-acre park are directed to use "the facilities" at park headquarters on River Road during regular business hours, Monday through Friday. Or it suggests using bathrooms at Pennsylvania welcome centers or area convenience stores.

Now it's making sense.

The park service needs to reduce congestion so motorists can rush to bathrooms outside the park when nature calls.

Is this beginning to sound familiar?

Back in 1997, the park service built what one member of Congress called "the Taj Mahal of toilets" at Raymondskill Falls.

A huge embarrassment at the time, the service constructed a $630,000 "outhouse," using $78-per-gallon exterior paint, $720-a-pound wildflower seeds for landscaping and composting toilets.

More than a half million dollars for a bunch of holes in the ground. Now the Taj Mahal is closed for the season.

Just because you can get the money doesn't mean you have to spend it.

Somewhere, someone with the common sense of a 12-year-old has to enter the picture. Wasteful spending deprives the needy of essential services and taxpayers of their hard-earned money.

The Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area traffic grant is part of 58 projects totaling $40.8 million announced last week.

I can only imagine how the other $40.3 million is being spent.

I hope it's not for prenatal MP3 players.