More than 1,400 projects are part of the North Carolina Department of Transportation’s 10-year State Transportation Improvement Plan. More than 250 of those projects directly impact communities in eastern North Carolina. Some projects are more controversial than others.
Chris Thomas has this.
Last week, NCDOT released its latest strategy for improving the state’s roads, ports, airports, railways, and bicycle lanes – also known as the STIP. The primary theme in the east: safety and connectivity.
“You know it’s a – compared to the rest of the state – this is a rural area other than the metro areas around Greenville and around New Bern which is growing quite a bit.”
John Rouse, NCDOT Division 2 engineer – covering the heart of the region, including Pitt, Craven, Jones, and Lenoir counties. Divisions 1 through 4 cover the eastern third of the state.
“Historically, we’ve had a high number of accidents and we have had fatalities over the years on some of our rural, two-lane primary roads…that is something that is a problem statewide and, you know, across the nation.”
Winding, two-lane, country roads leave drivers vulnerable to car wrecks. In a 2008 report from NCDOT, there were more wrecks on rural roads than urban roads. That risk increases along with higher volumes of traffic – like on U.S. 17 between Jacksonville and New Bern.
That section of highway was originally completed in the late 1920s, nearly 15 years before Camp Lejeune was built.
The first of four sections of the 22.1 mile project – widening the stretch between Jacksonville and Belgrade at the Jones-Onslow line, is completed. The additional three-quarters of the $145 million project – leading to the U.S. 17 New Bern Bypass – is funded through 2018.
“Over the years with the development in New Bern (and) obviously the development around the Jacksonville area, you know, those areas have mushroomed in growth has grown quite a lot over the last decades but you know they still have a rural, primary two-lane highway that’s trying to serve the connection between those two cities and those two metro areas.”
In nearby Havelock, NCDOT has hit a snag with a long standing project. The U.S. 70 bypass has long been in the works – with plans initially made in the late 1970s. The proposed $220 million project is meant to alleviate traffic congestion and help accommodate a future interstate – I-42.
But soon after the a federal agency gave the project the green light late last year, the Southern Environmental Law Center filed a suit against the department on behalf of the Sierra Club of North Carolina.
The proposed route cuts through the Croatan National Forest. If the project goes through as planned, acres of century-old long leaf pine trees will be cleared – along with living examples of the state’s heritage, according to Southern Environmental Law Center representative Geoff Gisler.
“We are the Tar Heel State because of the tar and the turpentine and the, what is called, naval stores, that were produced from the sap of long leaf pine and so we have a long history with these forests.”
The Croatan Forest serves as habitat for the endangered red cockaded woodpecker. Gisler said the Center has had its eye on the project but ramped up its involvement in 2008 when the project’s environmental impact assessment kicked off. About two weeks after the Federal Highway Administration in Dec. 2016 approved its record for decision, the law suit was filed.
Rouse said he couldn’t comment on the legal proceedings but in a Dec. 29 report from the New Bern Sun Journal, Havelock Commissioner Danny Walsh is quoted as saying “a lot of people have done a lot of work” to ensure wildlife “were all taken care of in the best way that they could be.”
“This is progress,” he’s further quoted. “It’s required for the future.”
Gisler believes NCDOT is passing up more useful and environmentally friendly options for the current plan for the bypass.
“There’s another alternative that they rejected that instead of going through parts of the national forest that have really great habitat, it would go through pine plantations – so trees that are…planted that are not intended to be habitats, that are intended to be cut. So it would go through pine plantations and would leave the important habitat of the forest protected.”
The project hasn’t officially halted but if the lawsuit is successful it could severely hinder the project’s progress since it would vacate the Federal Highway Administration’s record of decision and prevent NCDOT from obtaining additional, necessary permits including from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
Further up the road in Greenville, construction on the Tenth Street Connector is underway.
The $69.8 million project links East Carolina University’s main campus with the Brody School of Medicine. More than a mile of 10th Street, one of the city’s main thoroughfares, closed last spring and isn’t expected to reopen until 2019.
That includes sections on and near Dickinson Avenue, an up-and-coming commercial area in the city. Near its intersection with Clark Street is Crossfit Greenville. One of its coaches is Adam Kolb.
“We knew it was going to come. We have some clients that work for the city, we have a couple city planners, actually, that are in that line so we knew it was coming.”
Kolb believes construction will be good for the gym in the long term since it will bring more traffic to the thoroughfare that connects downtown Greenville with U.S. 258. But in the projects initial months, Kolb said some clients had a hard time getting to the gym.
“With the construction happening, it’s been a little confusing for our clientele to get here, finding their way through these back roads, so they’re just getting creative and just finding different ways to get here but when its complete, I think it’s going to be very good for the gym, yes.”
Construction on the 1.4 mile connector is beginning to take shape along Dickinson Avenue. An approach resting on several pillars is visible amongst the relatively low-lying buildings nearby.
“It’s an urban widening project as we refer to it so…those projects tend to be complicated because you’re building a multi-lane highway within a fully developed area but so far, everything with construction is going well.”
State agencies are gearing up for a new gubernatorial administration. That can mean major changes for the way things are done throughout the state but Rouse doesn’t believe the NCDOT boat will shake too much.
“In general, transportation is a non-partisan issue. All parties, you know, they want prosperity…they want quality of life improvements.”
I’m Chris Thomas.