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Road study to include focus on 107 traffic
By Lynn Hotaling
Driven by comments from both the audience and its members, Jackson County’s transportation task force Monday (July 12) agreed the group would have a dual focus: an immediate look at mounting traffic problems on busy N.C. 107 between the Business 23/107 and N.C. 116/107 intersections along with a long-range study of the entire Dillsboro to Cullowhee corridor.
Though they hadn’t intended to host a public forum Monday, task force members opened the floor for comment once it became clear that many of the 50 or so spectators had attended with the understanding they would be allowed to speak.
The theme that echoed from speaker to speaker, including the dozen task force members, was that something needs to be done now about the escalating traffic on N.C. 107.
“A vision of 25 years is too long. I think you should focus on immediate needs, maybe a five-year plan, and start with the 107 corridor,” said Roger Turner of Smart Roads Alliance, the grassroots organization that spearheaded resistance last year to a Southern Loop bypass proposed by the N.C. Department of Transportation.
Other speakers asked that the group keep in mind the results of the county’s Smart Growth initiative – that county citizens overwhelmingly supported the idea of maintaining Jackson County’s rural character – and that the group remember that “long-term planning can be a self-fulfilling prophecy.”
“We have heard that growth is coming and there’s nothing we can do,” said one speaker. “If we plan for growth, growth will occur.”
DOT planner Beverly Williams said that many types of transportation improvements have a 10-year timeline if they are part of the state’s Transportation Improvement Plan.
“That’s the reason we try to plan 25 years,” she said.
Williams mentioned that some smaller projects, including access management and service roads, can sometimes be accomplished at the district level, shortening the time needed to complete such improvements.
Most committee members followed the lead of town of Sylva representative Eldridge Painter, who advocated making 107 traffic issues the group’s main focus.
“I’ve seen 107 go from practically a dirt road to what it is now,” Painter said. “I’ve been in business on that road for 40 years. Somehow we’ve got to do something with 107 as the primary target.”
“I agree with Eldridge. I want to narrow my focus to 107. I’m impatient. I want to see something done now,” said Jim Hartbarger, Dillsboro’s representative on the committee.
Others, like Sylva attorney Jay Spiro, pointed to county commissioners’ November resolution establishing the task force to do a comprehensive study of the entire corridor.
“The resolution from county commissioners sets out our goal,” he said. “I agree we need to do both. We need to set goals 20 years out, and we also need immediate plans with goals we can accomplish.”
Commissioner Roberta Crawford, the county’s representative, agreed with all three sentiments.
“I want to address Smart Growth,” she said. “And I’m like Eldridge – I’d like to see us do something with 107. But I also want a plan that DOT can get behind.”
Webster’s representative on the task force, Jay Coward, said he’d like to see public transportation on 107 as one of the group’s goals.
“The age of cheap oil is history,” he said.
After determining that the group would have a dual mission, task force members defined the area to be examined during the longer range corridor study.
The group voted to approve a map generated by DOT based on discussions during the task force’s April meeting. While the map is not expected to be available for publication until at least next week, the study area, generally defined at the April meeting, extends south on 107 as far as the N.C. 281/107 intersection, northwest to Gateway, west to the intersection of N.C. 116 and U.S. 441 and east on U.S. 74 as far as Blanton Branch. The study area also appears to include old N.C. 107, Cane Creek and Wayehutta, as well as areas between Cullowhee and Webster.
The group then turned its attention to a discussion of data collection to aid in the traffic study. Williams said traffic counts have been scheduled and will be completed in September.
Though access management was mentioned during Monday’s meeting as a possible short-term solution to 107’s traffic problems, Reuben Moore, DOT’s 14th division operations engineer, said he doesn’t want to narrow the group’s focus to access management.
“Access management is one of many tools,” he said Tuesday. Other options could include widening lanes in some areas from 10 to 12 feet, he said.
Moore also said that access management on 107 would be expensive – possibly costing $2 million – and that the local division can only fund projects up to $200,000. However, money might be available through the N.C. Moving Ahead Program, if that funding is continued for a third year, he said.
Should that money be available, a plan for 107 improvements could be completed and construction begun within two years, Moore said.
Though several at Monday’s meeting referred to an access management “study” Moore had done, Moore said Tuesday that he had not done a study but a presentation on the concept of access management that included some local examples.
Moore said that currently the Wal-Mart shopping center is 107’s best example of access management, because all traffic for the various stores there enter through one driveway.
Moore participated in Monday night’s meeting in place of DOT engineer Jamie Wilson, who was out of town. Task force members in April asked Wilson to join the task force.
The transportation task force will next meet Monday, Aug. 9, at 6 p.m. in Courtroom 1 at the Justice Center.
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