News
Survey about Business 40 revamp plans nearly done
By 2 to 1, opinions favor shutting down highway for 2 years
AP File Photo
Planners say that the stretch of Business 40 in question was built in the 1950s and needs to be replaced.
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Published: April 27, 2008
Pollsters for the N.C. Department of Transportation are nearly finished surveying city residents about how they believe the state should proceed with planned construction work on a 1.1-mile stretch of Business 40 through downtown.
Outreach workers are revisiting parts of the West End and other neighborhoods along the downtown highway in the early evening to try to talk to residents they didn't contact when they visited last winter, survey officials said.
The pollsters will be wearing orange and blue shirts with the Business 40 logo and will be carrying identification badges.
In two weeks, survey teams will also ask motorists on downtown access ramps to Business 40 whether they would prefer to have the highway completely closed for two years so it can be rebuilt more quickly, or favor the other option: Keep the road partly open for up to six years, with little or no access to entrance or exit ramps.
The survey effort will be wrapped up by the end of the month so the final results can be tallied and ready for three corridorwide meetings that the DOT is planning to hold this June, officials said.
State highway engineers will also unveil their analysis of how the different closure scenarios will affect traffic on alternative routes, what the principle routes will be, and how they will need to be improved, DOT officials said.
"That's what everybody has been asking for, and so far we haven't been able to tell them," said Ed Lewis, the DOT's head of public involvement and community studies. "But come June, we'll have that."
Lewis was attending a project-information meeting for residents of neighborhoods in southeastern Winston-Salem earlier this month at the Sprague Street Recreation Center.
Also, Lewis said, alternative traffic-routing proposals will include how to serve the new downtown baseball stadium, which is expected to open next spring.
Those scenarios could involve completing renovations at the interchange and the bridge at Peters Creek Parkway.
That means that both commuters and stadium traffic in the westbound lanes could be funneled downtown by getting off at Peters Creek Parkway.
The entire Downtown Business 40 renovations are projected to cost at least $100 million. Construction will involve the stretch of highway between a point just west of Fourth Street to a point just east of Church Street. The section of highway was built in the mid-1950s, and traffic planners say that it has worn out. Plans include removing or replacing up to 11 bridges either on or over the freeway.
Though no lanes will be added to the four-lane highway, it will be repaved and entrance and exit ramps reconfigured to make them safer and able to better accommodate the at least 70,000 vehicles a day that are expected to use the highway after it reopens.
Jumetta Posey is the owner of Neighborhood Solutions, a company from Denver that has overseen the information-gathering effort.
She said that since October, survey workers have knocked on the doors of more than 13,400 houses in 16 neighborhoods, and gathered more than 5,100 responses from residents since October.
Another 7,300 responses have been gathered from area businesses, educational institutions, churches and at Hanes Mall.
Posey said that opinions have been running about 2-to-1 in favor of closing the highway and rebuilding it as quickly as possible.
Others feel strongly about keeping the highway open in part.
Mary Hargraves, who works in the N.C. Division of Public Health office off Waughtown Street, attended the Business 40 outreach meeting at the Sprague Street Recreation Center.
She said she uses Business 40 for her job and thinks that pass-through access needs to be maintained along the stretch, even if construction takes longer.
Not having it open at all would be too disruptive, she said.
"I-40 alone can't handle all the traffic," Hargraves said. "What if there's a major crisis. There's a lot to be said for keeping Business 40 open."
■ Jim Sparks can be reached at 727-7301 or at jsparks@wsjournal.com.
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N.C. Politics
Federal Politics
The Downtown Summer Music Series will begin on Thursday. Ed Bumgardner talks to some of the organizers of the Downtown Jazz lineup, in which a form of music known as "smooth jazz" will play a more prominent role this year.
Thursday's relish stories will appear in the Entertainment section.
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