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Realignment of Interstate 26 would cost $293 million
By Dan McCue
Staff Writer
A consultant working at the behest of the Berkeley/Charleston/Dorchester Counties Council of Governments has projected that a realignment of Interstate 26 through the neck region of the Charleston peninsula would likely cost just under $293 million.
As an alternative, Jennifer Humphreys, a senior transportation planner with Wilber Smith Associates, told members of the council and Charleston’s state legislative delegation that the state would do well to consider significant improvements to local roadways throughout the neck.
She projected that those improvements, which would include repaving roads, improving drainage and adding bike lanes and curb cuts for mass transit stops, would cost 94% less than a realignment of I-26 at roughly $18 million.
“It would be very nice to realign I-26. It’s not a bad idea at all,” Humphreys said. “However, our analysis found that we’re not going to have the kind of congestion on the interstate through the neck that would warrant that kind of expenditure at this time.
“In our view, it’s the local roads that are going to see most of the traffic congestion associated with future development in the area. Given how difficult transportation project funding is to come by these days, it just makes sense over the next 10 to 15 years for the state to concentrate its efforts there.”
Humphrey’s report comes against a backdrop of continuing controversy over the access road being proposed to accompany the development of a new port terminal in Charleston. After an appeal by local developers and the S.C. Coastal Conservation League, the state Department of Health and Environmental Control agreed to reconsider the permit it issued for the access road. A final decision by the DHEC board is expected on Feb. 8.
Although the DHEC review of the permit is predicated on air quality and economic impact issues associated with the access road, several of those involved in the appeal are also major proponents of moving I-26 to the east.
“Our concern is that once you build an elevated access road connecting the port to I-26 as it’s currently configured, it’s going to greatly limit your options for moving the road in the future,” said Winthrop C. Allen, director of development for Magnolia Development LLC.
Magnolia Development’s principals would like to see a temporary port access devised that would leave the possibility of realigning I-26 open until further study can be done, Allen said.
But Tom Berry, a spokesman for DHEC, said consideration of a future realignment of I-26 is beyond the scope of what the agency is considering.
“Basically, leaving aside the environmental issues, this review of the permit stems from our staff not having all the information it needed to conduct a thorough review of the potential environmental impacts associated with the access road,” Berry said. “During their original review, our staffers believed the Macalloy Corp. still owned the property known as the Macalloy site and made the assumption that because the company was out of business, nothing was being done with the site.
“We subsequently learned the land had been purchased and of the plans to redevelop it, and so we’re conducting an additional review. ”
Anthony Fallaw, a spokesman for the SCDOT, said the agency was waiting to see the Wilbur Smith report and had not come to a firm conclusion about realigning I-26. But he didn’t hesitate to suggest that the access road, if built, could be relocated to accommodate such a realignment.
“The issue is whether you want to tear all that down, once you made such a substantial investment,” he said. “It could be done, without question, but would you if you had to foot the bill for it?”
It’s certainly a prospect that seemed to give S.C. House Speaker Bobby Harrell pause when asked about a possible realignment.
Humphrey said her 100-page report focuses on the potential widening and realignment of I-26 between interchange 217 and 219B, which is east of the proposed access port access road.
Most of the truck traffic generated by the planned terminal will be to the west of the area, she said.
“If the state improves these roads, providing people with alternate routes they’d be happy to take, we believe that it’ll greatly relieve the dependency on I-26,” she said. “Right now the local roads through the neck are in good shape, in terms of capacity and the number of lanes that are available. We found that they’re actually under-used because they’re in such bad shape.”
But Robert L. Clement III, one of the partners in the investment group behind Magnolia Development, said he believes the alternative to realignment that’s been suggested is wrong-headed.
“When they talk about putting the traffic on local roads, what they’re talking about is King and Meeting streets, roads that are already being impacted by the longer trains that are coming out of the (expanding) Kinder Morgan facility,” he said. “So it’s basically coming down to a pick-your-poison situation. Either we’re going to have gridlock on I-26 or we’re going to have gridlock on Meeting Street.”
“The bottom line is we’d like someone to please take a time-out and take the time to do a thorough study of the region’s transportation needs,” Clement said.
Dan McCue is a staff writer for the Business Journal. E-mail him at dmccue@charlestonbusiness.com.
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