There may be new things developing at an interchange near you, now that a new authority has been created to provide sewerage to development sites near Interstate 80.

Recently, five municipalities and the county voted unanimously to create the Neshannock Creek Watershed Joint Municipal Sewer Authority, with plans to build a sewage treatment plant.

"A ballpark cost of the total system ... completed with everything we're proposing would probably be $20 million," Mercer County Commissioner Chairman Cloyd E. "Gene" Brenneman said Tuesday.

The intent is to keep the Mercer area from losing business development possibilities as it did a couple of years ago when Cabela's, a mail-order outdoor sports outfitter based in Nebraska, was unable to develop property along I-80 and U.S. Route 19 because sewers weren't available.

"The main purpose of the authority is development," Brenneman said. "I predict, I may not see it, but you probably will, an explosion of industry there. It's the prime interchange on 80 just waiting for development. Everything's right except we do not have that sewage. My projection is within five years we will."