SILER CITY — The town’s board of commissioners discussed various road projects submitted to N.C. Dept. of Transportation (NCDOT) for prioritized scoring and funding at its meeting Monday.
Community Development Director Jack Meadows presented to the board a list of various projects the town wants NCDOT to help fund through its Prioritization 7.0 scoring system.
The list was categorized into projects such as highway or bike & pedestrian.
The highway projects proposed by Meadows and staff include creating a bypass for U.S. Hwy. 64, extending the current U.S. Hwy. 64 superstreet — an intersection designed to reduce vehicle conflicts — to reach Silk Hope Road, improving 2nd Avenue and making improvements to the intersections of Raleigh Street with 2nd Avenue and 6th Avenue.
Meadows told commissioners the bypass and the superstreet will be necessary in the coming years as Siler City continues to grow.
“The superstreet would extend the life of (U.S. Hwy.) 64, but at some point, 64 can’t maintain traffic, and you’ll have to have a bypass,” Meadows told commissioners. “I think that’s why this is being proposed for this future need.”
The board also received a list of 17 projects in the bike and pedestrian category, most of which involved repairing, rebuilding and creating new sidewalks across town.
Meadows said NCDOT ranked the sidewalk projects using an established formula, which includes the following factors: safety, accessibility, demand and cost. From there, NCDOT will “score” each project in order to prioritize them by urgency and importance.
“This is a opportunity to go to ask DOT to fund some of these projects,” Meadows said. “We’re just prioritizing right now … picking one or the other, which one’s a higher priority.”
No vote was taken on the item, and commissioners asked Meadows to proceed with submitting the proposed projects to NCDOT for grant funding.
Other business:
Commissioners voted unanimously to set a public hearing on April 17 regarding extending the mayor’s term from two to four years. The board is expected to vote on an ordinance on May 1 to go on the ballot for November’s election.
Reporter Taylor Heeden can be reached at theeden@chathamnr.com.