PITTSBORO — After suggesting it might amend the proposed road alignment for the North Chatham Park Way to circumvent private property in Pittsboro’s North Woods community, the N.C. Dept. of Transportation has decided to move forward with plans to bisect the neighborhood, according to a NCDOT email obtained by the News + Record.
North Chatham Park Way’s imminent construction has been hotly contested since planning accelerated in January. At a pubic hearing on Jan. 7, NCDOT unveiled “Alternative 6,” an iteration of the road’s trajectory that would run through North Woods’ 200 acres of rural land. The four-lane highway is necessary, NCDOT has said, to serve the many thousands of new residents who will inhabit Chatham Park in coming years, and to mitigate traffic issues through downtown Pittsboro.
North Woods property owners, though, have argued the road should run east of their land through Chatham Park territory.
“There’s a very obvious and simple solution,” Mark Pavao, a North Woods neighbor, previously told the N+R, “which is to shift the road by a couple hundred yards and to use land that is already owned by the developer for whom this road is being developed.”
To elicit support for their cause, Pavao and the 16 other North Woods land owners launched a petition on change.org called “Save North Woods Neighborhood.” They implored residents of the greater Pittsboro area to voice their disapproval of the proposed North Chatham Park Way alignment. Within a week, more than 2,300 had signed. As of Tuesday, the number exceeded 3,600.
In response to widespread public outcry, NCDOT released “Alternative 7” last month, a new alignment that shifted the road east, though not entirely beyond North Woods’ borders. The revision was a “big improvement,” neighbors said, though not ideal. They still requested further amendment, but were encouraged to see NCDOT’s apparent interest in compromise.
“My understanding after the last meeting was that NCDOT was looking to shift the road from Alternative 6 to Alternative 7, which largely kept the neighborhood intact,” Pavao told the News + Record last week, “and they were open to considering our proposal which would entirely keep the neighborhood intact.”
Pavao was “shocked,” then, when the latest NCDOT correspondence doubled back on previous talks.
“After a detailed review of public comments and careful consideration of the benefits and impacts of the options (Alternative 6, Alternative 7, and an alignment east of the North Woods/North Village property line), NCDOT has completed the alternative evaluation process and has selected Alternative 6 as the preferred alternative,” said NCDOT Division Engineer Patrick A. Norman in an email addressed to the North Woods community members.
Norman acknowledged Alternative 7 was designed in response to 650 public comments submitted directly to NCDOT, but said the original track “was the least environmentally damaging, preferred alternative.” He confirmed for the News + Record that his email can be taken as official notice of the department’s final decision.
“The selection does mean that Alternative 6 is the official route and designs will be finalized along this location,” he said.
Besides North Woods residents, about 300 Chathamites who had submitted public comments to NCDOT over the last several months were advised of NCDOT’s decision. Many expressed dismay in responses to the mass email.
“(T)his is such an unfortunate and disappointing outcome,” one commenter said. “I was optimistic, or at least hopeful, that the NCDOT was going to do the right thing after they proposed Alternative 7 which was a reasonable attempt to save the neighborhood. It is incomprehensible why NCDOT would pull an about face at this point.”
Others echoed the sentiment and chided Chatham Park Investors, who they suggest to preserve more land for development.
In an emailed statement to News + Record, Chuck Smith — vice president of planning at Preston Development Company, which is developing Chatham Park — denied that his company had anything to do with NCDOT’s alignment decision. He suspected Alternative 6 was chosen for its minimal environmental impact, corroborating Norman’s argument.
“Since the Town of Pittsboro’s 2011 Thoroughfare Plan and before Chatham Park had any plans approved, the alignment of this road has been shown going through the Northwoods neighborhood just west of the Chatham Park property line,” Smith said. “In our subsequent planning since 2011 we have followed that alignment making required adjustments within our property because of environmental requirements and every step of the way the Town, County and NCDOT have gone through very public processes reaffirming these alignment locations.
“Once NCDOT got more involved in the actual design of Chatham Park Way outside of Chatham Park as it became a project they were considering for construction, we watched from the sidelines just like everyone else. We played no role in them arriving at their decision. I would imagine the alignment remained as is because 1) there was much less environmental impact compared to the alternatives and 2) moving the alignment to the east would have shifted the impacts off of Northwoods but onto other non-Chatham Park neighborhoods north of Northwoods as the road made its way back to 15/501. You would have to ask NCDOT if that is the case however.”
Pavao disagrees, but has resigned to the probability that much of his land will be appropriated, and his now-quiet neighborhood divided by the four-lane road.
“This is a very sad development and very frustrating in light of all of the tremendous support that private citizens have put forward to help us save our community,” he said. “I am still hopeful, not optimistic, but hopeful, that our elected officials will stand up and join us to push back against NCDOT and Chatham Park Investors so that we can produce a subtle shift in the alignment that produces a good safe road without dividing our neighborhood.”
Reporter D. Lars Dolder can be reached at dldolder@chathamnr.com and on Twitter @dldolder.