By Matthew French
Staff Writer

The Army Corps of Engineers recently completed a study to evaluate the traffic impact of the South Carolina State Ports Authority’s proposed container terminal on existing roads in the vicinity of the former Charleston Naval Base.

The preliminary report was completed in February and indicates that current roadways will likely be at or near capacity even if the new facility is not constructed, and recommends further studies be conducted to determine the best course of action for access roads construction.

As part of the report, the Army Corps evaluated what the future conditions of the existing roadways might be in the year 2025. The report examined how much traffic the roads would bear if the terminal is built and if it isn’t. Using a computer model, the Corps determined that many of the roads in North Charleston will be at or exceeding their capacity in 2025, even if the terminal is never built.

The SPA projects the terminal in North Charleston would add about 11,000 vehicles per day to the local roads, with about two-thirds of that number truck traffic.

The Army Corps is looking at alternative roadway corridors to the proposed Navy base site, and will include its findings in its Environmental Impact Study. The findings included in the study will determine if and when construction permits will be issued. The SPA expects to receive permits by August of next year.

“We have a law that directs us to expand and it says we’re to be done by the end of 2008,” says Byron Miller, spokesman for the state ports authority.

While the SPA was directed to take control of expansion of the terminal facility itself, the roads leading to and from the facility is actually the jurisdiction of the Department of Transportation, the public railways division of the state Commerce Department and the State Infrastructure Bank.

When the SPA split the Charleston Navy base with the city of North Charleston, a deal was struck that says the state would pay for an access road from Interstate 26 to the port would have to be built. A “rough cost estimate” places the worst-case scenario costs at between $250 million and $300 million, according to Ronald Mitchum, executive director of the Berkeley-Charleston-Dorchester Council of Governments.

However, in a Dec. 13, 2004, letter to state Sen. Glenn McConnell,R-Charleston, president pro tempore of the state Senate, Richard Tapp said those costs could soar even higher because of inflation and repeated delays in the permitting process to begin construction on the terminal.

Tapp is the secretary for the South Carolina Transportation Infrastructure Bank and has been saddled with soliciting about $150,000 from the state Legislature to fund a study to determine the best course of action for building the roadway, as well as other infrastructure improvements, including the possible moving of Interstate 26 farther to the east.

“By combining the access road construction with the proposed relocation of a two-mile section of I-26, by my calculations, the state may save approximately $83 million due to the (90 percent/10 percent) cost sharing with the federal government relating to interstate construction,” Tapp wrote. “In other words, we might be able to have the federal government subsidize up to 90 percent of a portion of that $251 million access road cost while simultaneously deriving the benefits of the I-26 relocation.”

Tapp asserted that a study, conducted by a certified engineering firm, would cost $150,000, but could prove that tying the projects together would save money. He said that the legal counsel for the Infrastructure Bank has determined that the bank is not empowered to fund the study. The money, if provided by the Legislature or state Department of Transportation, would go to the Berkeley-Charleston-Dorchester Council of Governments or a similar organization for disbursement.

“Unfortunately, from a timing perspective (given the ongoing Environmental Impact Study process associated with the Navy Base terminal) this study needs to begin immediately,” Tapp wrote.

In a second letter Tapp sent to state Sen. Hugh Leatherman, R-Florence, Tapp said he spoke with Mitchum of the Berkeley-Charleston-Dorchester Council of Governments, who also heads the Charleston Area Transportation Study, or CHATS, and who expressed a willingness to fund $50,000 of the $150,000 study. However, the CHATS board of directors must first approve that move, and that meeting is scheduled for later this month

Feasability study scope of work

Below is an abbreviated proposed scope of work for the $150,000 feasibility study as proposed by Davis and Floyd Inc., a Greenwood-based engineering firm.

• Prepare construction cost estimate for I-26 relocation. This analysis to provide an approximate scenario for what possible cost savings to the state may occur by combining the I-26 relocation with the new connection to the port terminal.

• Provide coordination with governmental agencies, local municipalities, businesses and property owners.

• Determine future traffic projections for section of I-26 from Mount Pleasant Street to Cosgrove Avenue.

• Obtain Charleston County Geographic Information System mapping to include aerial imagery, road and street network, topography, land use zoning, etc.

• Perform physical, geometric, operation and performance analysis of existing I-26.

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