Wednesday, November 17, 2010

While You and I Are Waiting for Business 40, Let's Help Design It


If you have not expressed an opinion about proposed Business 40 changes to bridges, interchanges and road design as presented at three NCDOT public meetings in mid-October, please do so soon, and contact NCDOT and City Council members with your ideas.

Although the timetable is not firm for when the work will be done, decisions are being made now on what will be done when it starts. One proposal for saving money and changing traffic is to close the bridge at 4th Street connecting the West End to Peters Creek Parkway, making a cul-de-sac there passing right in front of
Hawthorne Art Gallery. Please check the pdfs listed below to see all choices proposed for the several bridge interchanges, and a link to a pdf of the comment form you can print and send to NCDOT.

Sadly, the Winston-Salem Journal did an unusually and truly terribly inaccurate job both in advertising and in reporting on the details of what actually was shown to the public at these October meetings (using graphics from the January 2010 Old Salem meeting on their website links still, for example).  And NCDOT at their Business 40 site (www.business40nc.com) has not yet updated it with these new choices as they told me they would be doing to allow further informed citizen input. Then again, they haven't really updated citizen info online since 2008. They do seem to staff a public meeting well (though I've yet to get an email from them after signing in with an email at every one of the half-dozen events I've been to).

Here are links to online copies of the very informative packets NCDOT provided at these public meetings:
An Overview of the Business 40 Project Thru October 2010
Detailed Design Drawings of the Alternatives at Each Interchange
Working Groups Plan for the Future and Contact Info to Share Your Opinions With
Public Comment Sheet