As badly as some people hate Breezewood, I can't imagine taking that curvy, crooked US 219 route as an alternative to it.
My dad used to like doing that fairly often. The first time or two, that I remember, being before I-68 was I-68...
It wasn't just an alternative to Breezewood itself - which I remember my dad wanting to avoid because in addition to it simply being Breezewood, PennDOT was also doing major roadwork there as well - but we also didn't bother with the Turnpike at all, just taking PA-31 over the Laurel Ridge to other back roads to home.
Many of those trips were before we had the internet, and I had yet to become aware of the Garret Shortcut, so we always stayed on US-219 winding up north via Berlin. Last summer (the first time since 2003 I was on US-219 in Somerset Co.), I made it a point to use the Garret Shortcut, and ended up thinking "Man, I wished I knew about this shit 2 decades ago".