View I-40 Bus on Shoulder System in a larger map

North Carolina's "bus-on-shoulder" pilot program is scheduled to start July 16, giving commuters on a few Triangle Transit routes the option to bypass rush-hour congestion by rolling on the Interstate 40 shoulder.

When traffic stops or crawls as slowly as 35mph, bus drivers on I-40 will be able to drive slowly on the shoulder, something that will continue to be illegal for other drivers.  The initial program will be in effect for a 10-mile section of I-40 in both directions between U.S. 15-501 and N.C. 147 (the Durham Freeway and Triangle Expressway), and in the eastbound direction for two miles from N.C. 147 to Page Road.

That stretch of I-40 is traversed only by a handful of Triangle Transit routes: ... [MORE]

House transportation budget writers decided Thursday where to absorb an expected drop in gas tax collections next year, and they delivered the biggest spending cut to the state's program for paving gravel roads and improving paved secondary roads.

The House Transportation Appropriations Subcommittee accepted a plea from Rep. Phil Shepard, a Jacksonville Republican, to ease the damage that a proposed budget would have caused for rural and urban transit programs.  The panel agreed to cut public transit grants by $2.6 million instead of the $8.6 million originally proposed, and it shifted the $6 million difference to the secondary road construction fund.

“Our transit system takes people to the doctor and dialysis and many places our senior citizens can’t get to, in the city (Jacksonville) and in the county (Onslow),” Shepard said in an interview. He said he saw less need for money to pave gravel roads.  (The House transportation money report and Shepard's amendment - which changes some numbers in the money report - are attached to this blog post.) ... [MORE]

Red is dead, and Orange may be passé. Consultants hired by Garner, the Regional Transportation Alliance and the regional planning agency CAMPO have redecorated the Triangle Expressway / 540 Outer Loop map with two new route colors: Lilac and Plum (see 5/23/12 story and 5/22/12 Road Worrier column with reader comments).

Appended to this blog post you can find two new documents: the Turnpike Authority's May 17 letter to the Federal Highway Administration, which includes the Regional Tranpsortation Alliance's Lilac-Plum update, and a large map showing where the Lilac and Plum routes would go.  [Note to jittery property owners: ... [MORE]

It's Day 1 of the 2012 legislative session, and already we have action on ferries, car inspections, toll roads and other transportation stuff.

* Inspections will still be required for all cars. The House-Senate Joint Transportation Oversight Committee today had no interest in discussing, evaluating or modifying a proposal to end the required safety and emissions inspections for vehicles from the three newest model years. It simply killed the bill in a 7-5 vote (see today's story with reader comments).

Meanwhile, without dissent or discussion, the oversight committee approved other legislative proposals:

* Updating top DOT job titles. This measure would retire the venerable title of state highway admnistrator, and give a new title to the person holding that job (currently, Terry Gibson): chief engineer.  DOT explains: We're way more than highways now. We're also bikes, trains, ferries, etc., etc.

DOT used to have somebody else called chief engineer as the top honcho for  something else called operations. After a department reorganization intended to reduce layers of management, the old chief engineer was moved under the wing of the old highway adminstrator.  Jon Nance, formerly chief engineer, now is addressed as ... deputy chief engineer. ... [MORE]

In her new proposed budget, Democratic Gov. Bev Perdue generally agrees with transportation proposals aired by House Republicans last week to put a cap on the state gas tax and to postpone new and increased ferry tolls for a year.

Ferries:  Perdue angered legislators in February when she refused to start collecting new tolls on two toll-free ferry routes, and higher rates on three tolled routes, as ordered in the state budget last year.  She cited economic hardship in ferry-dependent coastal communities.  Republicans sharply criticized Perdue but shied away from fighting her on this.  Both budget drafts, theirs and now hers, would put off the new tolls until July 2013.

But there's a difference here: What to do about the additional $2.5 million in toll collections that had been expected in the budget? ... [MORE]

View NC 12 & NC Ferry Routes in a larger map

The NCDOT Ferry Division says it will add two more runs this weekend to the Swan Quarter - Ocracoke ferry route, to make up for some of the delays caused by shoaling that has disrupted the busy Hatteras - Ocracoke ferry across Hatteras Inlet (see 5/8/12 story with reader comments).

On Saturday and Sunday, along with regular departures from Swan Quarter at 10 a.m. and 4:30 p.m., new departures will be added at 7 a.m. and 1 p.m.  In addition to the regular departures from Ocracoke at 7 a.m. and 12:45 p.m., new departures will be added at 10 a.m. and 4 p.m.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is expected Saturday to start a two-week dredging operation to clear sand out of the Hatteras Inlet channel.

View 540 Outer Loop in a larger map

Some commuters in western Wake County will face the choice of driving a free, four-mile detour during construction of a new bridge on Green Level Church Road -- or paying a toll for a shorter detour that will open about the same time.

The state Department of Transportation says it has awarded a $2.5 million contract to S.T. Wooten Corp. of Wilson to replace the 60-year-old Green Level Church Road bridge over White Oak Creek at the Cary-Apex town limits.

The contract gives Wooten the option to start work between Aug. 1 and March 1, 2013, with completion in 240 days. While the bridge is closed during construction, drivers will have a detour of four miles via Green Level West, Wimberly and Jenks roads. ... [MORE]

View SEHSR alternatives in a larger map

The state Department of Transportation says it will hold a public meeting at the North Raleigh Hilton from 4 to 7 p.m. Tuesday, May 15, to air new revisions to its proposals for closing rail crossings, building bridges and routing trains through northern Wake County as part of a planned fast-train shortcut between Raleigh and Richmond.

These are changes from the plans that were discussed in 2010 at public meetings for the Southeast High Speed Rail Corridor.

Under the new DOT recommendations, the preferred train route would wipe out the $5.9 million Thales Academy K-5 campus in Wake Forest,  a private nonprofit school that serves 400 students (see today's story with reader comments).  Other changes include building a rail underpass for Elm Avenue in Wake Forest, instead of closing it where it crosses the tracks now.

The SEHSR website includes an April 2012 report with updated info on the preferred route from Raleigh to Richmond.  Detailed maps with the northern Wake changes will be posted online in advance of Tuesday's public meeting.

The N.C. Turnpike Authority's plan to start construction this year on the $725 million Monroe Connector-Bypass near Charlotte was set back Thursday when the 4th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals ruled in favor of environmental groups that sued over misleading information in the project's environmental impact study, the Charlotte Observer reported.

Instead of making a required evaluation of the costs and benefits of building the road by comparing this to what would happen if the road was not built, the NCDOT study incorrectly had compared building the road to ... building the road. 

The 4th Circuit ruling said NCDOT should have acknowledged its error when regulatory agencies and environmental critics raised questions, according to Steve Harrison's story today in the Charlotte Observer: ... [MORE]

View I-85 Yadkin River Bridge in a larger map

The work has taken longer than expected, but construction on a long-sought replacement for the harrowing Interstate 85 bridge near Salisbury will mark a milestone this weekend when the current two-lane northbound traffic is moved from the narrow old bridge to a new four-lane bridge.

Gov. Bev Perdue traveled to the site of the half-mile-long I-85 Yadkin River bridges project Thursday to announce the traffic shift, set to take place early Saturday morning.  That's almost two months later than the state Department of Transportation had expected to make the change, according to DOT officials and a timeline posted at the project website.

DOT had predicted that both northbound and southbound drivers would be off the old bridge -- two lanes in each direction -- by May 21.  When that happens, now scheduled for July, northbound and southbound drivers will share the new four-lane northbound bridge temporarily.

The twin four-lane bridge for southbound traffic now is expected to open in early 2013, instead of early November as scheduled earlier.

The narrow bridge, built in 1955, carries 70,000 cars and trucks every day on the main interstate highway between Richmond and Atlanta. Its replacement will give travelers a faster and less frightening trip over the Yadkin River.  DOT is spending more than $200 million to replace the bridge and add new lanes to a nearby stretch of I-85.

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