NO MID-CURRITUCK BRIDGE

Concerned Citizens and Visitors Opposed to the Mid-Currituck Bridge

Posted to: NewsNorth Carolina The Associated Press © March 26, 2013

RALEIGH, N.C. Gov. Pat McCrory’s administration supports a bill to eliminate a mandate on North Carolina transportation officials to build toll-road projects in Gaston County, the northern Outer Banks and near Wilmington. State Transportation Secretary Tony Tata told top legislative leaders his agency backs a House bill altered by the Senate. The legislation initially directed engineers to review an unlikely alternate route for part of Raleigh’s Outer Beltline. The Senate added provisions deleting the Garden Parkway, Mid-Currituck Bridge and Cape Fear Skyway from state law requiring their construction. The bill has sat in the House for two weeks awaiting action. Tata said in a letter last week the department believes all projects should compete for funding through the state’s data-driven prioritization process. McCrory would be asked to sign any bill into law.

Submitted by BruceSiceloff on 03/20/2013 – 09:08

Rodanthe 3/9/13

Gov. Pat McCrory declared a state of emergency Tuesday for N.C. 12 in Dare County, a move aimed at speeding up the state’s effort to shore up a fragile road frequently closed in recent weeks because of ocean overwash.

The state Department of Transportation is seeking permits for beach renourishment and dune construction at the S-Curves area near Rodanthe on Hatteras Island. DOT plans to use $20.8 million in federal emergency funds related to damage caused last fall by Hurricane Sandy.

Meanwhile, the department has long-range plans to elevate more than four miles of N.C. 12 on bridges high above the surf.

“The people there have real concerns about the road they depend on to get to work, school or medical appointments,” McCrory said. “They need a highway that is not forced to close every time a storm approaches.”

Read more here: http://blogs.newsobserver.com/crosstown/mccrory-declares-state-of-emergency-for-nc-12-on-outer-banks#storylink=cpy

By Bruce SiceloffThe_News_and_Observer

By Published: March 20, 2013 Updated 15 hours ago
Read more here: http://www.newsobserver.com/2013/03/20/2766876/falling-gas-tax-collections-mean.html#storylink=cpy

Bruce Siceloff — bsiceloff@newsobserver.com

 

RALEIGH — More people are traveling North Carolina highways these days, but they’re pumping less gas and diesel fuel into their trucks and cars. So our fast-growing state will have less money to spend for its transportation needs in coming years.

That may be the biggest message in the transportation  budget released Wednesday by Gov. Pat McCrory.

The gasoline and diesel fuel tax is the primary money source for the state Department of Transportation, which is expected to spend $3.87 billion in state funds for the fiscal year that starts July 1.

But fuel consumption is falling steadily as Americans move to cars that get more miles out of every gallon. .

“Fuel efficiency is clearly having a significant impact in terms of total gallons consumed across the state,” said Mark L. Foster, DOT’s chief financial officer. “… The price of gas and the economy also have had an impact.”

In North Carolina, a fast-growing population and an expanding economy pushed fuel sales higher in the early years of the last decade. Taxed fuel sales peaked at 5.6 billion gallons in 2007 and have declined steadily since then, dropping below 5.3 billion gallons last year – even as the state added 700,000 residents.

The state brought in more fuel tax money for several years because the legislature allowed steep increases in the state tax on each gallon. But North Carolina’s political tolerance for higher gas taxes appears to have hit a ceiling. There is no talk in Raleigh of increasing the rate, now 37.5 cents.

So McCrory’s budget predicts that fuel tax collections will begin a steady decline, from a peak of $1.84 billion this year to $1.75 billion in 2015. The highway use tax on car sales – $529.7 million this year and rising – is expected to show continued improvement, but not enough to keep up with the road, transit and ferry needs.

“We believe we have large, unmet transportation needs that go beyond our funding capacity and the current revenue model,” said Julie White, who lobbies for urban transportation needs as director of the N.C. Metropolitan Mayors Coalition. “We’d like to see new revenue sources identified.”

Prospects were a bit brighter in other parts of McCrory’s budget.

The General Fund’s biggest money source is the personal income tax, which is on track to continue the growth it has seen since it bottomed out in 2010. Individual income tax collections are expected to increase from $10.65 billion this year to $11.8 billion in 2015.

One way to set aside more money for roads and bridges, White said, is to stop diverting gas tax money from the state Highway Fund to the state’s General Fund, where it is spent for non-transportation purposes.

Members of the Senate’s transportation appropriations subcommittee were briefed Wednesday on transfers of $258 million a year to the General Fund. The money is spent for a variety of purposes outside DOT, some of them with connections to transportation.

“Our position is that we need to be honest with taxpayers about how we’re currently spending money we get from them in transportation taxes, before we ask for more,” White said.

Siceloff: 919-829-4527 or blogs.newsobserver.com/crosstown or twitter.com/Road_Worrier/

Published: March 14, 2013

2013-03-14T23:13:15Z

By Bruce SiceloffThe_News_and_Observer

Raleigh

By Bruce Siceloff — bsiceloff@newsobserver.com

RALEIGH — The southern leg of Wake County’s 540 Outer Loop could face more years of delay unless the state House goes along with a Senate proposal to kill three unrelated toll projects: two bridges on the coast and a road near Charlotte.

Both chambers have approved a House proposal that would allow the state Department of Transportation to move ahead on a stalled plan to extend the Outer Loop from Holly Springs to Interstate 40 near Garner, as part of the Triangle Expressway toll road.

It would repeal a 2011 law that barred DOT from considering the unpopular Red Route option, which would bulldoze parks and neighborhoods in Garner. Federal regulators say they will not consider the state’s preferred Orange Route, which would trample sensitive wetlands, unless the law is repealed to let DOT conduct full studies comparing both routes.

But before the Senate endorsed the Red Route legislation on March 7, it expanded the measure to effectively eliminate the Cape Fear Skyway in Wilmington, the Mid-Currituck Bridge in Currituck County and the Garden Parkway in Gaston and Mecklenburg counties.

The N.C. Turnpike Authority, now part of DOT, has been developing the three toll projects since they were authorized by the legislature in 2006.

The Senate version now is parked in the House Rules Committee while its original sponsors, two Wake County House members, figure out what to do. The House could agree with the Senate and kill the three toll projects, or the two chambers could appoint a conference committee in hope of finding a compromise they can agree on.

If the two chambers can’t agree, the Red Route legislation could die, preventing DOT from getting back to work on the next leg of TriEx.

“What we really need is just the Red Route bill enacted as we brought it forward (in the House), so we could move ahead on that issue,” said one of the sponsors, Rep. Nelson Dollar of Cary. “Obviously, it’s a major policy piece that was added to this (in the Senate), and it sort of complicates the considerations.”

The $1 billion Cape Fear Skyway already was struggling under predictions that heavy state subsidies would be necessary to compensate for light toll collections. But DOT hoped to start construction in the next couple of years on the Currituck bridge and the Garden Parkway. Both starts have been delayed by environmental lawsuits and opposition from the Republican-led Senate.

Sen. Bill Rabon, a Southport Republican, persuaded the Senate to have the three projects compete for state funding with non-toll roads, based on the merits of their costs and benefits. Supporters have said that shift would make it unlikely that the projects would succeed.

Transportation Secretary Tony Tata did not comment directly on the TriEx legislation or the three projects targeted by Rabon.

“We support any efforts that further our use of our data-driven process for prioritizing projects,” Tata said Thursday by email.

The $650 million Currituck bridge is designed mainly for vacationers who now sit through long traffic jams on summer trips to the Currituck Outer Banks. Rabon has blasted it as a “cronyism” project pushed by former Democratic legislators.

But the Currituck County commissioners, seven Republicans, reject Rabon’s argument and plan to send a delegation to Raleigh next week to lobby for the bridge.

“I don’t think the Senate is aware of the magnitude and the impact of this bridge on all the northeastern counties,” said Paul R. Martin of Currituck, the commissioners’ vice chairman. He said he expected to find more support for the toll bridge among state House leaders.

Siceloff: 919-829-4527 or blogs.newsobserver.com/crosstown or twitter.com/Road_Worrier/

Read more here: http://www.newsobserver.com/2013/03/14/2750331/triex-and-red-route-fate-tied.html#storylink=cpy

 

By Cindy Beamon

The Daily Advance

Friday, March 8, 2013

The state Senate on Thursday voted to end funding for the Mid-Currituck Bridge as it’s currently planned.

But state Rep. Bill Cook, R-Beaufort, said he’s been assured by House leaders that House Bill 10 will never gain full approval by the General Assembly.

“Now, it will go back to the House, (and) there it will die. That’s what the House leadership tells me,” Cook said Thursday.

The bill proposes to remove funding for three state projects under the N.C. Turnpike Authority, created in 2002 by the General Assembly to oversee costly road projects that lawmakers designated as priorities. The proposed Mid-Currituck Bridge, the Garden Parkway in Gaston and the Cape Fear Skyway could all be on the chopping block. Bill supporters said two other Turnpike projects were too far along to end their funding.

If the measure passed in the Senate on Thursday is approved by the General Assembly, the projects would have to compete for regional dollars under the state Department of Transportation’s capital improvements plan.

Bridge supporters have repeatedly said the shift would essentially kill the project. In earlier challenges to bridge funding, now-retired lawmaker state Bill Owens, D-Pasquotank, claimed the $660 million bridge would take too large a chunk from the region’s road construction funds to make it feasible under the DOT funding plan.

But Cook said Thursday he was assured by other senators that the change would not end chances for the bridge’s construction. If the entire District 1 backed the project, funding should be available, he said he was told.

Cook, who voted against House Bill 10 three times, said he wasn’t convinced the change wouldn’t hurt the bridge’s chances for construction.

“I couldn’t vote for it because it took away the priority which the bridge presently enjoys,” he said.

Cook said he was taken by surprise when the measure came up for a vote on Wednesday.

When House Bill 10 was first introduced in the House, it contained nothing about changing funding for the Turnpike Authority projects. The House version of the bill only removed a restriction on the Turnpike Authority’s selection of a corridor location for the southeast extension of N.C. Highway 540 in the Research Triangle area.

That changed, however, after House Bill 10 reached the Senate’s Committee on Transportation. There the change removing the funding for the three Turnpike projects was inserted into the bill.

Cook said he didn’t know about the change until the bill’s second reading and a vote before the full Senate on Wednesday. The bill passed, but opposition required the Senate to wait another day for a third reading of the bill before it could be voted on for adoption.

On Thursday, House Bill 10 passed the Senate by a 36-14 vote. It now heads back to the House where lawmakers there will have to approve the version including the language removing the Turnpike projects’ funding for the measure to be adopted.

Cook said he’s optimistic the bill will not go any farther.

“I am convinced it will not go anywhere,” he said.

The recent challenge to the seven-mile span connecting Currituck’s mainland to the Outer Banks is one of several that have beset the proposed project in the past couple years.

Since 2010, funding for the project has been diverted to other state road projects, reportedly because the toll bridge was not yet ready for construction.

Under the leadership of retired Senate leader Marc Basnight, D-Dare, the General Assembly voted to pay $28 million over the next 30 years in “gap funds” to keep tolls from being too high. The state was also been negotiating with a private partner to construct and manage the bridge.

After Basnight’s departure and a political power shift in the state Senate, some lawmakers have sought to delay or halt funding for the project.

One of the recent assaults has come from Sen. Bill Rabon, R-Brunswick, chairman of the Joint Legislative Oversight Committee, who says the project was approved under previous political “cronyism.”

Bridge supporters say halting the project would mean a loss for taxpayers. The state has already invested nearly $25 million, mostly in federal dollars, in planning and designs for the span, Owens said before leaving office. Ending the financial negotiations with the state’s private partner in the project could cost up to $10 million more.

McCrory: Limit state spending to cover Medicaid overrun

Published: March 8, 2013 Updated 3 minutes ago

2013-03-08T20:43:39Z

By Lynn Bonner The_News_and_Observer

By Lynn Bonner — lbonner@newsobserver.com

Gov. Pat McCrory is ordering state agencies to reduce their spending to cover an overrun in the state Medicaid budget estimated at up to $130 million.

McCrory told his budget office Friday to transfer available state funds to pay Medicaid costs, and told agencies to stop giving raises, and to limit purchases, travel and other expenses.

The Medicaid budget has always been hard to predict. A state audit this year found that Medicaid overspent its budget by $1.4 billion over three years.

McCrory said in a statement that it was time to end previous state budget practices that produce ongoing shortfalls.

“It is time to solve this mess, not kick the can down the road and manipulate the budget as was done in the past. It stops now,” he said.

McCrory has cited Medicaid budget overruns as one of the reasons he decided not to support the Medicaid expansion under the federal Affordable Care Act.

Read more here: http://www.newsobserver.com/2013/03/08/2735438/mccrory-limit-state-spending-to.html#storylink=cpy

Move by Rabon deals heavy blow to Cape Fear Skyway project                        

Sen. Bill Rabon, R-Brunswick, has said he is concerned that politics are interfering with fair play in the road building process. StarNews file photo

Mar 6, 2013

By Molly Parker / Molly.Parker@StarNewsOnline.com

The proposed Cape Fear Skyway toll bridge and road between New Hanover and Brunswick counties may have suffered a mighty blow Wednesday with a move by Sen. Bill Rabon to remove the project from special standing in state statute and instead run it through a rigorous competition with other transportation projects statewide.

Rabon, R-Brunswick, sponsored an amendment to place this and other toll road projects into the regular, competitive rotation for state roads funding.

The amendment was endorsed by the Senate Transportation Committee and preliminarily by the full Senate on a 37-13 vote. Rabon has said he is concerned that politics are interfering with fair play in the road building process.

“It doesn’t point a finger at anyone,” he said on the Senate floor Wednesday. “It just makes everything fair and transparent for everyone and every project in the state.”

He did not return phone calls seeking comment.

Rep. Susi Hamilton, D-New Hanover, said she’s interested to hear from Rabon about his motivation for the amendment to House Bill 10, which was originally introduced as a technical bill related to a study of the Triangle Expressway Garner extension.

“I know Sen. Rabon usually does things with a solution in mind,” she said.

More debate is expected on the bill Thursday when it receives a third and final reading. It will then have to go back to the House for consideration.

In addition to the Cape Fear Skyway, Rabon’s amendment also sidelines the Mid-Currituck Bridge to the Outer Banks and the Garden Parkway near Charlotte.

Rabon’s amendment calls for increasing the Mobility Fund balance from $58 million to about $121 million by redirecting funds set aside for the Garden Parkway and Mid-Currituck Bridge projects. Danny McComas, chairman of the State Ports Authority and a former Republican state representative from New Hanover, said he fought to include the Cape Fear Skyway toll project in state statute in the late 2000s. McComas said the project would benefit the area by alleviating congestion on Cape Fear Memorial Bridge and opening a faster thoroughfare to the Port of Wilmington.

McComas also said he was confident Rabon must have an alternative plan for the Cape Fear Skyway.

“I’m sure he’s got something else, because he understands the dynamics that we’re up against,” McComas said.

Rabon said during floor debate that he did not intend to squash anyone’s plans.

“We’re not cramping anyone’s style,” he said. “We’re simply giving everyone a fair shake.”

But individuals familiar with the Department of Transportation’s prioritization process said the move could significantly delay or permanently derail the projects.

Rabon told the StarNews in June that these toll projects should “stand on their own merit” like other transportation Mobility Fund projects, which are ranked based on a cost-benefit analysis that takes into account travel-time savings and other factors.

Rabon said then that inclusion of the projects in the Mobility Fund would follow an executive order issued in 2009 by Gov. Beverly Perdue.

The order called for changes in the road-building process to ensure plans are developed and projects awarded based on “professional standards and not other considerations” and to make the best use of the state’s limited highway dollars.

Questions were raised last year about who owns properties along the proposed routes of the next three toll-road projects. Media reports from across the state have suggested that current and former local and state elected officials and their supporters stand to benefit financially if those projects are built, either through the sale of properties they own along or near the routes or improved access to their investments because of the roads.

Rabon said previously that is among the reasons he wants to take them out of state statute and force them to compete with other projects.

“To single out pet projects, if you will, to put them in a little, special category … just breeds political play,” Rabon said then.

Metro desk: 343-2389

NC senators seek to remove mandates for toll roads

Published: March 6, 2013 Updated 14 hours ago

2013-03-07T00:48:27Z

By GARY D. ROBERTSONThe_Associated_Press

By GARY D. ROBERTSON — Associated Press

RALEIGH, N.C. — A majority in the North Carolina Senate said Wednesday the General Assembly should get out of the business of choosing which toll road projects should be built, and in turn generated another conflict with Republicans in the House.

Senators tentatively agreed 37-13 to a House bill that initially directed the Department of Transportation to review an alternate route for the planned southern section of Raleigh’s Outer Beltline so that federal funds can start flowing again. But Senate Republicans added language to the bill that also removes the mandate in state law requiring proposed toll projects for Gaston County and Wilmington-area roads and for the Mid-Currituck Bridge to be built.

Sen. Bill Rabon, R-Brunswick, who offered the provision, said deleting the Garden Parkway, Cape Fear Skyway and the coastal bridge from state law won’t kill these toll projects. Rather, he said, the ideas will be thrown back into the pool of road construction projects being evaluated and prioritized by the state Department of Transportation using hard data.

The language “makes everyone compete on a level-playing field,” Rabon said. “We’re simply giving everyone a fair shake.”

But the law certainly would give the projects black eyes. Rabon and other Republicans have been critical of the toll roads that they argue were directed by political considerations – largely when the General Assembly was under Democratic rule.

Rabon’s change would free up another $63 million annually that legislators previously have pledged to give annually as “gap funding” for debt to build the Mid-Currituck Bridge, a 7-mile span connecting mainland Currituck County with the northern Outer Banks that could trim travel times for vacationers and storm evacuees, and the Garden Parkway.

The parkway, a proposed 22-mile toll road linking Gaston County and west Charlotte, has been opposed by recently elected state legislators and challenged in court by environmentalists last summer. Both projects had been on track for completion in 2016. The Cape Fear Skyway – a 9.5- mile toll road and high-rise bridge – is in its preliminary stages.

The $63 million would increase the state’s Mobility Fund, which spends money on projects of statewide or regional significance that reduce congestion.

“In my opinion, a vote against this, you’re setting back any projects in your areas by some days or even years,” said Sen. Tom Apodaca, R-Henderson, the House Rules Commission’s chairman.

The proposal, however, wouldn’t stop a mandate under state law to build the 20-mile Monroe Bypass, a proposed toll road the state has worked on for more than a decade but also was delayed by environmental challenges.

A final Senate vote is expected Thursday on the bill, which will then return to the House. A primary sponsor of the House version didn’t immediately return a phone call seeking comment. The bill would go to a conference committee to work out a compromise if the House rejects the Senate’s changes.

The southern section of Raleigh’s Outer Beltline, also known as N.C. Highway 540, also would remain a toll project. The General Assembly passed a law in 2011 preventing the state from considering a route that went through several Garner neighborhoods. The decision caused federal transportation officials to halt project planning money. Supporters of the new bill insist the Garner route will never be built but must be studied.

The western portion of the Outer Beltline was completed in 2011 and 2012 as North Carolina’s first modern-era toll road.

Read more here: http://www.newsobserver.com/2013/03/06/2730120/nc-senators-seek-to-remove-mandates.html#storylink=misearch#storylink=cpy

February 14, 2013

From the Island Free Press www.islandfreepress.org for more news and information about Hatteras and Ocracoke islands and the rest of the Outer Banks.

New transportation secretary talks about
local highway, bridge, and ferry issues

BY CATHERINE KOZAK

The state’s new transportation   secretary backs the Bonner Bridge project, but he is not so sure about the   Mid-Currituck Bridge. He also doesn’t favor a ferry solution for Oregon   Inlet, but he’s willing to consider it in Currituck.

Some might take it as a good sign   that Anthony J. “Tony” Tata, appointed last month to head the state   Department of Transportation, calls the spot at the north end of Rodanthe   “S-turns,” the name surfers use for the popular surf spot, instead of   “S-curves,” the official name transportation officials call their current   most troublesome hotspot on Highway 12.

In a telephone interview this   week, Tata, 53, who grew up in Virginia Beach, said he has visited the Outer   Banks many times over the years with friends who have relatives here and to   surf.

Hatteras’ own Bert Austin, former   sheriff of Dare County who now lives in Grandy, is one of his close friends,   Tata said, and Austin’s nephew is his best friend.

“I’ve had a special relationship   with the Outer Banks since my childhood, so I understand that the roads and   ferries and shipping are the lifeline for the good folks on the Outer Banks,”   he said. “There’s a lot of key issues out there that we have to take on.”

Tata, a retired Army brigadier   general who served from 2006-2007 as Deputy Commanding General of U.S. forces   in Afghanistan, was fired in September after 20 months as Superintendent of   Schools in Wake County. Supporters say that Tata, hired by Republicans, was a   victim of politics on the newly Democratic-controlled board.

Newly elected Gov. Pat McCrory’s   office said in a statement that Tata’s 28 years of experience in the   military, where he addressed complex transportation challenges involving   ports, highways, airfields and rail, makes him well-suited to the job as   transportation secretary.

Close observers of the NCDOT, an   agency continually under pressure from the public and legislators, might say   that Tata’s ability to work in a war zone gives him the temperament to lead   DOT.

Despite being the subject of   intense media scrutiny for the last two years, Tata spoke in a relaxed and   amiable manner. But he didn’t pretend he knew all the answers.

“As a new secretary, you might   imagine, we’re trying to take a new look at several different projects,” he   said.

When asked about talk in the   legislature of tolling the Hatteras-Ocracoke ferry — the busiest ferry   route in the state —he initially responded that “our feeling is that we   should toll it all, or none.”

“I don’t see any reason for the   citizens of the Outer Banks to pay for everything and not the tourist,” he   said.

The toll increases at the Cedar   Island and Swan Quarter routes to Ocracoke are already law, he said, that   will go into effect June 30.

But Tata softened his stance in   response to local objections that contend it would be unfair to toll the   ferry between Hatteras and Ocracoke, since, as the only access to the island,   it is akin to a road.

“I think that’s a valid argument,”   he said, “and if there is no other alternative access, it’s technically not a   road, but it is a point of entry.”

Tata dismissed the idea of using   high speed ferries to transport people and vehicles from Oregon Inlet to   Rodanthe, rather than replacing the Herbert C. Bonner Bridge, and maintaining   access on Highway 12, as some environmental groups have suggested.

“Ferries,” he said, “are not   without disruption to the environment, also.”

But he said later in the interview   that ferries of some kind are being considered as an option in the   department’s re-evaluation of the proposed Mid-Currituck Bridge project.

Tata said that DOT intends to move   forward with the Bonner Bridge construction project that has recently   started, as well as continuing with plans to rebuild and maintain Highway 12.

The DOT plan to replace the bridge   is currently being challenged in federal court by environmental groups.

Any notion of building a 17.5-mile   long bridge that would bypass hotspots in Pea Island, he said, is not   realistic.

“We just can’t afford a billion   dollar bridge,” he said.

“We feel it’s feasible to build   two bridges for $200-$250 million,” he said, referring to spans over Oregon   Inlet and over the new inlet on Pea Island.

Construction of the proposed   Mid-Currituck Bridge from the mainland to Corolla is still being evaluated by   DOT, Tata said, including the possibility of using ferries.

A legislative transportation   committee has questioned whether the state can afford to build the bridge.   DOT engineers have also said that the project is a low priority compared with   other state transportation needs.

“We’re having conversations about   that right now,” he said. Part of the discussion includes a back-up plan to   address traffic congestion if the bridge project is jettisoned.

Tata said that he intends to   “leverage projects to create jobs” and to find ways to increase efficiency of   maintenance of the state’s roads and bridges. Projects scheduled in the TIP,   the state’s transportation plan, are also being evaluated.

“I’m looking at all of it,” he   said, but declined to elaborate. “We’ve got a budget submission in a couple   of weeks.”

As far as the construction of the   U.S. 64 widening project from Columbia to East Lake, Tata said he understood   that the four-lane road was critical to alleviate the traffic bottleneck   during hurricane evacuations.

But when told that residents say   they’ve never experienced a traffic back-up during evacuations — mainly   because it’s not the route tourists favor — and that the road would destroy   their homes, Tata said that there has to be a balance between safety and   heritage.

“That’s something that we’d take a   look at,” he said. “The highway widening is scheduled right now for 2018, so   we have time.”

Tata said he’d like to sit down   with East Lake folks and talk to them, adding that he plans to visit every   transportation division in the state to hold town hall-style meetings.

The date when he’ll be coming to   Dare County has yet to be determined.

“There’s 14 divisions and one of   me,” he said. “I might wait till the weather improves and the surf is up.”

 

From The Outer Banks Voice

Project updates include Alligator bridge closing
| February 1, 2013

 

Hobbs was the Chamber's keynote speaker.

Hobbs was the Chamber’s keynote speaker.

Barry Hobbs, project manager for the North Carolina Department of Transportation, provided updates on numerous regional highway projects Thursday, including one that will close the Alligator River Bridge for about two weeks. Hobbs was the keynote speaker at a luncheon hosted by The Outer Banks Chamber of Commerce.

After his presentation, Hobbs took questions from the audience.

Of particular note, Hobbs verified that the Alligator River Bridge is scheduled for closing from April 2-14 while a mechanical part in the draw span is replaced. The bridge carries U.S. 64, which is the most direct route from the west to the Outer Banks.

NCDOT determined a temporary ferry service could not be used while the span is closed, so east and westbound traffic will need to take the more circuitous routes leading to U.S. 158 in the north and traversing Pasquotank, Camden and Currituck counties.

Hobbs also said the dredge working the channel between Hatteras and Ocracoke Island had moved 76,000 cubic yards of sand and was “making progress” toward reopening the vital ferry route linking the two islands.

In response to a question, Hobbs said to his knowledge, the Army Corps still had plans to deploy a dredge to move some sand from the ocean off Rodanthe to replenish the beach at the troubled S-Curves just north of the village.

Other solutions, such as placing sandbags weighing several tons along the route have failed, and using hardened structures similar to those protecting the temporary bridge at the new Pea Island inlet are prohibited by state law.

Possible solutions may include constructing a bridge in the same place as the current road north of Mirlo Beach or building a bridge further to the west in Pamlico Sound waters.

Meanwhile, test pilings have been sunk for a replacement to the Bonner Bridge. They will soon undergo vertical and lateral stress tests similar to the same pressures the actual span will experience.

The NCDOT schedule shows a spring 2013 start date for actual construction of the span with completion by February 2016.

However, environmental groups have challenged the process used by NCDOT to choose the so-called “short bridge” route and Hobbs could not be certain of the actual start date, noting “it’s in the hands of the judge” at present.

The new bridge will feature nine navigation spans if and when it is built, which should allow vessels to find deep water much easier in shoaling events and reduce the amount of dredging currently required to keep Oregon Inlet navigable for larger boats.

NCDOT plans to begin replacing the temporary bridge at Pea Island with a permanent structure in the spring of 2013.

The schedule for U.S. 64 widening from Columbia east to Manns Harbor is slated to begin in 2016 and be completed by 2018, including replacement of the Alligator River Bridge in 2016.

Colington Road widening to 30-32 feet in to accommodate pedestrian and bicycle traffic will see acquisition of right of way’s in 2015 and construction in 2017.

In the interim, the hairpin curve in front of the Methodist church on Colington Road will be relocated in 2013.

Significant questions were directed to Hobbs concerning the “Mid-County” bridge in Currituck, which would connect mainland Currituck in Aydlett with Corolla on the Outer Banks.

The bridge, a public-private sector joint venture that will feature a toll road, is awaiting a record of decision, the final environmental sign-off required before contracts can be put to bid.

Even if the “ROD” is approved, construction of the bridge would require significant upfront funding from the state and the current Republican-controlled legislature has thus far been cool to the idea of pumping any money into the project.

Hobbs also noted that virtually every project slated for future construction could face legal challenges and other hurdles from environmental groups and federal agencies.

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