Here's the 'bad news' about Leesville Road

From the News & Observer:

Bruce Siceloff, Staff Writer

Leesville Road is still a skinny two lanes wide near the Interstate 540 Outer Loop interchange that opened in 1999, but its traffic is starting to thicken.

Apartment complexes are sprouting along the road north from I-540 to Leesville's intersection with Hickory Grove Church Road. The Franciscan School at that intersection is a car-pool magnet. A Wake County elementary school is under construction nearby.

Brian Ray says it takes 15 minutes each morning to drive the 1.2 miles from Hickory Grove Church Road to I-540. Keith Spainhour finds it slow going, too, en route from his home in northwest Wake County to work in Research Triangle Park.

They both worry that the morning drive will get a lot worse when the new Sycamore Creek Elementary School opens in fall 2008. They recall that a bond issue Raleigh voters approved in 2005 included money to widen this part of Leesville Road.

So, they ask, When will the new asphalt arrive?

"I was wondering what the delay was and why they haven't started it," Spainhour said.

Alas, traffic will get thicker here before it gets faster. Leesville will stay skinny for a few more years. The Wake school system will widen part of the road near Sycamore Creek Elementary School, but the city won't start work on the rest of the road -- a $10.2 million job -- until 2011.

"Ohhhh, no," Sue S. Harris said, gasping when she heard that distant date. "That will be miserable. Man, that is bad news."

Harris lives nearby in eastern Durham County. She frequently passes through the neighborhood on her way to I-540 ("a wonderful artery," she says) and Triangle Town Center. She sees Leesville Road at its worst in the morning, when she chauffeurs two grandsons to the Franciscan School.

Construction of the I-540 arc across North Raleigh has increased traffic on each of the loop's north-south spoke roads. But the growth has been heavier on some others than on Leesville Road.

The state Department of Transportation counted 22,000 cars a day on Leesville near I-540 in 2005, up from 15,000 in 1998 before the loop opened.

The city is moving faster on a few more urgent road projects funded with 2005 bond money -- improvements to Perry Creek, Tryon and Falls of Neuse roads.

"Falls of Neuse has been pretty monstrous as far as its traffic growth," said Eric J. Lamb, city transportation services manager.

With road construction inflation running about 15 percent per year, costs have risen well above the $60 million voters approved in 2005. Short funding has forced the city to shelve a few items on the 2005 list, including the widening of Mitchell Mill Road.

"But we're still moving forward on Leesville," Lamb said.

Meanwhile, Harris wants city engineers to consider improving how the traffic signals handle Leesville's heavy morning flow. She would like to see the city tinker with the timing at the Farless Road intersection -- to give more green-light time to Leesville drivers and a bit less to those on Farless.

Also see our post on morning traffic congestion.

Morning Traffic Congestion

We've had a few questions/complaints about traffic congestion in the morning as residents are leaving Harrington Grove. Following is a summary of some information received from the City.

Update: The City is planning to widen Leesville Road from I-540 to New Leesville Boulevard to a four-lane median-divided section with curb and gutter, sidewalks, and streetlights. This project is planned to begin construction in 2011, with the design and public involvement process starting in 2009.

In the short term, we are looking to partner with Wake County Schools to extend the improvements that the school is making all the way down to I-540. These improvements would add an additional southbound lane from Norwood Road to the I-540 interchange, which will specifically benefit the morning rush hour. It wont fix your situation completely, but it should provide some substantial improvement.

I can tell you that the City is working with Wake County Public Schools to piggy back onto some road improvements associated with the elementary school that is being constructed. These improvements will result in two southbound lanes from the beginning of the school property down to the I-540 interchange. The remainder of the road is in the CIP (Capital Improvement Program) but I don’t believe it is funded in the next five years. It was a candidate project in the last bond issue but exorbitant increases construction prices severely impacted the number of projects that could be built with the Bond Funds. There has been mention of another Bond Referendum for next year and this would certainly be a candidate project if that happens. The CIP is available on the City’s Web Page (PDF).

It should be a significant improvement over the current situation. There will continue to be one lane northbound and two lanes southbound from the school down to the interchange. Northbound traffic will remain as it is today, one lane up to the existing New Leesville Boulevard, until the entire project is built. There should be no significant transition problems once the construction is complete but it will add significant capacity to the southbound traffic. Expediting this portion of the improvements was a “target of opportunity” that would allow traffic to take advantage of the improvements that the school system had to build anyway as a part of the school construction.

Additionally, one of our signal technicians will check the signal operation during the morning commute and school take-in times to make sure the signal is operating properly and to make adjustments to the timings if needed. Thank you for bringing your concern to our attention.