Folks missing out on waterway — maybe for good

People think they know the South Carolina coast.

They drive the length of Highway 17, past strip malls and golf courses, car lots and T-shirt shops.

They stay at the beach, visit downtown Charleston, maybe a couple of plantations.

And then it's been there, done that.

But all of these folks -- tourists and locals alike -- are missing out.

There's really only one way to fully take in the grandeur of the South Carolina coast, and it's the Intracoastal Waterway.

For more than 200 miles, the waterway bends and winds its way through this state's forests, harbors and salt marshes. Along its routes, there are places untouched since colonial times, seldom seen by human eyes, where dolphins play undisturbed for hours.

It's a shame so many people have never seen it -- because it may not be around much longer.

Breathtaking scenery

At 10 p.m. Thanksgiving night, after the turkey has been picked clean and the Detroit Lions have been trounced, ETV will broadcast a special on the waterway called "Slow Ride: The Life and Times along the S.C. Intracoastal Waterway."

The show is produced and directed by Tim Fennell, a gifted filmmaker at the College of Charleston. He and his crew sailed the waterway, telling stories of folks who live beside it, make their living traveling it or explore it just for the sake of doing so.

It's a great film. The cinematography is breathtaking, the story heartbreaking.

South Carolina's waterway is used more than any other state's, save for Florida, yet it goes ignored by federal and state officials. It's being allowed to silt in. Before long, it could become impassable.

It will not only ruin some of the most beautiful spots on the East Coast, it will cost South Carolina billions of dollars.

Bureaucrats gone bad

It takes millions of dollars each year to keep the Intracoastal Waterway dredged from Virginia to Florida, but politicians have ignored it for nearly a decade.

The Bush administration slashed funding for the waterway years ago, and the Obama administration has done no better.

According to the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway Association, South Carolina's waterway needs $6 million in work; President Barack Obama offered $800,000 for 2010. Congress might be generous and nearly double that amount.

The bureaucrats caused this with a stupid usage formula. Every month, millions of tons of fuel, raw materials and manufactured goods are moved on the waterway -- enough to fill two million trucks a year. But because that amount of traffic pales in comparison with, say, the Mississippi River, most of the inland waterway maintenance money goes elsewhere.

The worst thing is this: billions of dollars in trade generated by recreational traffic on the waterway does not figure into the federal government's usage formula. In the eyes of pencil pushers, the waterway doesn't merit saving.

Too bad a few of them don't come down, hop on a boat and see for themselves.

Perhaps in the meantime, they'll at least see Fennell's documentary. They could stand to learn a thing or two.

Reach Brian Hicks at 937-5561 or bhicks@postandcourier.com. Read more columns by Brian Hicks here.