The MLA for Weyburn-Big Muddy MLA says whatever the provincial government is doing to fix Highway 35 is not working and a member of the public says the road's so bad it's called the "Road to Baghdad."

"From Oungre to the U.S. border, the road is absolutely unacceptable," said Brenda Bakken last week after learning of another recent incident in which a motorcyclist lost control on the road. "It's dangerous."

Some parts of the road are not even pavement anymore, she said. "It's just gravel," she said. "Someone will be killed or seriously injured. I couldn't believe how badly it's deteriorated, even since last year."

Bakken also raised the issue in the summer of 2003 after a motorcyclist showed her a chunk of pavement that left the road and barely missed his head as he drove along.

The response in the legislature this spring from then-minister of highways Mark Wartman included an acknowledgment the government recognizes the surface "continues to experience failures under heavy truck loadings."

Wartman said more than $20,000 per km. was spent last year on maintenance on the road or $230,000. "Due to the ongoing risk of surface failures, the department reduced the speed limit from 100 km/hr to 80 km/hr," the minister reported. Wartman has since been moved to minister of agriculture and food.

Bakken said the government is either not spending enough money to maintain the road properly or it needs new technology.

"People in this area are paying road taxes on their gasoline and the oil revenue coming from here is going into the provincial coffers but we can't get a decent highway to drive on," she said.

All Saskatchewan is being hurt by this road, said the MLA. "We used to have boat after boat and camper after camper going north across the border to fish but it's not happening any more. That has a high cost to the Weyburn economy," she said.

Members of the public are starting to let her know they agree with her.

The trucker who alerted Bakken to the accident said last week he arrived at the scene of about half a minute after it happened. Chad Morris of Weyburn said the bike rider, from B.C., was scraped up and scared after attempting to pass a truck.

The rider lost control and fortunately slid into the ditch or he would have been under the truck, said Morris, who watched in horror. The driver of a camper stopped to push the bike to the side of the highway and took the man and his bike to Regina, he said.

Morris makes two trips a day hauling crude oil from the Weyburn area to North Dakota and has seen the highway deteriorate even since last year.

"It's gotten progressively worse," he said. "Last summer (the department of highways) was putting pavement in the potholes. This year, they're picking up the gravel from the side of the road and putting it in the potholes and it's spreading out. There's three-four inches of gravel on the highway," he said.

"Chunks of pavement break out as you go through the pothole. I see it through my rear view mirror. They could hit a person and would kill them."

Morris said repair costs to the trucks using the highway are increasing because parts wear out more quickly, but they have to use that route. Other trucks are going around by Plentywood because of the road, a detour that adds 100 miles or so to the trip, he said.

Former Weyburn resident, Shane Parent, said he can't understand why the Weyburn business community is not complaining about the road.

It's keeping people from coming up through Weyburn from the U.S. and they must be feeling the loss, said Parent. "I'm amazed people are not up in arms."

Parent said he complained three years ago about the road to 10 different people, including the highways minister, the premier, and the tourism department. He only received three replies and he still hasn't heard from Wartman, he said.

"The joke now is that it's the road to Baghdad," said Parent. "I've been on gravel roads that are better than that and some areas on it are all gravel now."

"When you cross the border, it's like switching from a cow path to the interstate," he said.