485: Move Goal Posts, Declare Victory

August 5, 2010 | Written by Mark Pellin

N.C. Department of Transportation officials have announced that a widening of the south Charlotte parking lot known as I-485, from Johnston Road to South Boulevard, is slated to begin in 2014, a year ahead of the state’s current schedule.

That should come as giddy news, except for the inconvenient fact that the widening project was originally scheduled for 2013, but two years ago was bumped to 2015. So, yeah, technically it is now slated to start a year ahead of the current schedule that is a year behind the original schedule. And forget mentioning that the entire outerbelt was launched with a target completion date of 2008; that’d just be rubbing it in.

Anyway, the widening project will also include a bridge at the Johnston Road interchange to allow easier access to the interstate. DOT says the whole widening project, which will add an extra lane in each direction to the four-lane highway that handles about 120,000 a day, will cost between $70 million and $75 million and should be completed by late 2016.

The expanded three-lanes in each direction, however, will still bottleneck to the existing two-lanes of I-485 past the Johnston Road interchange and traffic counts are likely to double by the time the widening project is finished. So we got that going for us.

Earlier this year, DOT officials announced that construction of the final leg of the outerbelt, a five-mile stretch from N.C. 115 to I-85 in northeast Charlotte, should be prepped to start later this year.

That, again, should come as giddy news, if Gov. Bev Perdue hadn’t last year proudly proclaimed that construction would start in 2009. The final eight-lane segment, with its estimated cost upwards of $300 million, is slated to be finished in 2015.

We need your help! If you like PunditHouse, please consider donating to us. Even $5 a month can make a difference!

Short URL: http://pundithouse.com/?p=2833

Recent Posts by Mark Pellin

Dale Johnson

August 8, 2010 - 4:38 pm

one point of contention I’d have with the local NCDOT guy.

Two additional lanes each way on the segment now specified for widening won’t do the job. The complete segment of Southern I-485 needs to be widen by two lanes both ways–from I-77 to SR 74 Independence Blvd. Some might argue all the way around to where the Eastern segment already has three lanes both ways……(technically, since the segment from I-77 to South Blvd is already three lanes both ways, only one additional lane is needed there, with two additional lanes both ways from South Blvd to Johnston Rd.)

If you only do it to Johnston Rd, it will still create a merging of four lanes into two eastbound, a major bottleneck, and with speeders line jumping in the lanes that merge we’ll still have the road backed up, only with twice the volume we do now, if NCDOT predictions are correct.

Minimally we need an additional lane both directions for the complete Southern segment–in reality we need two lanes both ways for the complete segment. Not sure why the DOT guy felt only to Johnston Rd would be the cure. That just moves the bottleneck about three miles east, with some relief with some of the flow getting off on Johnston Rd.

Bottom line, the current plan will provide minimal relief (congestion won’t be quite twice as bad) once the project is finished. Quite disappointing……if the current project is coming in at much lower costs, as would be suggested since the recession is seemingly creating lower costs for road construction, why not apply the savings toward widening the whole Southern leg, which would significantly ease congestion? And if the type of financing being used for the NE leg is so beneficial, do that also to cover the cost of the whole Southern leg.

Volume predicted to double, road capacity will be increased 50%, congestion will be almost twice as bad as it is now, already at an undesirable condition, when finished. Your GOVCO at work. Let’s move the problem three miles East and call it relief.

Like or Dislike: 0 0