INC NEWS - East End Connector LEFT OUT of plan (N&O article)

[Caleb Southern]

Road plan imperils Triangle projects
East End Connector, signal system left out

By BRUCE SICELOFF, Staff Writer
News & Observer

As state transportation officials update their spending plan, the Triangle's
top priorities appear likely to be delayed for years or turned down
altogether.

A computer-synchronized overhaul for Raleigh's traffic signal system, No. 1
on Wake County's wish list, gets no money in the latest draft of the
Transportation Improvement Program for 2006 through 2012. The draft is now
circulating among members of the state Board of Transportation.

Durham County's top request is the long-sought East End Connector, to
relieve residential neighborhoods of dangerous cut-through traffic between
three busy commuter routes. Groundbreaking was set for 2010 in the state
plan adopted two years ago, but the draft update would put off construction
indefinitely -- until sometime after 2012.

Some revisions are possible before the transportation board formally
releases its draft plan April 6. The board plans to seek comment in public
meetings across the state and then approve its final six-year plan for $6.6
billion in transportation improvements in July. 

Triangle leaders have been bracing for bad news since January, when the
state transportation department said it would withhold more than $300
million that Wake, Durham and five other counties in the DOT's Division 5
were expecting. The region spent more than its share in the past decade
under the state's "equity formula" for distributing transportation funds.
State law requires the DOT to reduce Division 5's allotment accordingly and
shift that money to other areas.

Despite the warnings, Wake and Durham officials expressed dismay about the
prospective cuts and delays.

"That's a shock," Ellen Reckhow, chairwoman of the Durham County
commissioners, said Friday when told the state might postpone the $90.3
million East End Connector. "I think there's going to be great consternation
in Durham as to why that's happening."

Joe Bryan, the Wake commissioners' chairman, said the state's allocation
formula does not fairly address the Triangle's urban traffic problems. "We
need to figure out how to get the transportation money where the congestion
is," Bryan said.

Other Triangle projects would suffer if the transportation update were
approved in its current form:

* A 12.4-mile extension of the Interstate 540 Outer Loop from Research
Triangle Park to Holly Springs for $294.6 million. Construction would move
from 2008 to 2012.

* Widening I-40 from Wade Avenue to U.S. 1 in Cary, the only part of the
interstate in Wake County with only four lanes. DOT officials had indicated
last year that money was available to add this $45.3 million project to the
schedule, but the draft 2006-2012 plan does not include it. Also awaiting
state funding is the widening of the parallel stretch of the I-440 Beltline
from Wade Avenue to U.S. 1 for $77.3 million.

* Widening I-85 for 7.5 miles from Hillsborough to Durham for $52 million.
Construction would be postponed from 2010 to 2012.

* Widening Alston Avenue between N.C. 147 and Holloway Street in Durham and
replacing railroad bridges, $19.9 million. The work would be put off from
2010 until sometime after 2012.

* Extending Booker Dairy Road in Johnston County for 3.7 miles from U.S. 70
Business west of Smithfield to U.S. 301, $31.6 million. Work would be
postponed from November 2005 to 2009.

* Widening U.S. 401 for 18.5 miles from Raleigh to Louisburg, including a
Rolesville bypass, $89.6 million. Construction would be delayed three years,
to 2011.

* Widening Davis Drive for five miles near Research Triangle Park, from N.C.
54 to Morrisville-Carpenter Road. Construction would be postponed to March
2006.

A proposed $28 million high-tech upgrade for Raleigh's 500 traffic signals
would speed cross-town trips and cut air pollution by reducing the time
drivers spend idling at red lights. Local leaders said it would provide
great environmental and transportation benefits for a moderate price. Last
year they announced plans to pay for it with the help of federal clean-air
funds and $7 million from the city of Raleigh.

But DOT officials have not guaranteed the state's share -- $4.2 million --
so the signal system overhaul is "an unfunded project" in the current
version of the six-year spending plan.

"Essentially the whole project is in limbo because they either can't or
won't put their part of it on the table," said Edison H. Johnson, director
of Wake County's transportation planning agency.

The six-year plan lists two other new Wake County projects but doesn't
promise full state funding. The 1.7-mile extension of Timber Drive in
Garner, from N.C. 50 to White Oak Road, would cost $11.2 million and begin
construction in 2009. The $18 million realignment of Falls of the Neuse Road
through Wakefield in northern Wake County, including a new Neuse River
bridge, would start in 2011.

Wake, Durham suffer

Wake and Durham counties stand to lose the most from this year's "equity
formula" reallocations, but leaders from other parts of the state have
shared their complaints that state funding is not keeping up with urban
traffic problems and the expense of interstate highway improvements.

The six-year update to the DOT plan will reflect both the equity formula
cuts for Division 5 and the effects of a statewide slowdown in
transportation spending.

Transportation officials have made most of their changes to the 2006-2012
plan in private. The DOT provided a copy of the March 9 draft of the
six-year plan in response to a public records request from The News &
Observer. DOT spokeswoman Ashley T. Memory said the document was
"preliminary and still subject to change."

Holly Springs Mayor Richard G. Sears said he will lobby DOT officials to
change the proposed four-year delay for the I-540 extension.

"This road is essential," Sears said, "not only to people in Apex and Holly
Springs and Fuquay-Varina, but also the people in Harnett and Johnston
counties and anybody else going that way."

Nancy M. Kelly, mayor of Rolesville, said she hoped DOT officials would
stick with their schedule to widen the two-lane U.S. 401.

Rolesville has two stoplights, and its population only recently reached
1,000. Kelly said three big development projects in the works will triple
the town census in three or four years. Three years is too long to wait for
a new bypass, she said.

"We have quite an amount of traffic," Kelly said. "If you don't need to come
to Rolesville between 4 and 6 p.m., it's probably a good thing to wait."

Staff writer Bruce Siceloff can be reached at 829-4527 or
bruce.siceloff at newsobserver.com. 



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