South Columbia construction to be shorter

A street widening project that will close one lane this summer on one of UNC’s busiest roads will now take about half the time officials initially projected.

The South Columbia Street project — which will add a center turn lane, bike lanes and sidewalks — has been a topic of debate among Chapel Hill, Carrboro and UNC officials for its cost and inconvenience to commuters.

Construction began in November, and traffic on a 0.8-mile stretch of the street will run only one-way from Fordham Boulevard toward Manning Drive starting later this spring. A detour will direct outbound traffic to Manning Drive.

But after Chancellor Holden Thorp sent a letter to the North Carolina Department of Transportation on Dec. 11 outlining the high costs of the project, the one-way construction period has been reduced — and so have the costs.

The construction project, which was initially to last six months, will take place from May 15 to Aug. 15.

It was originally expected to cost between $850,000 and $1.5 million for detouring routes and reorganizing scheduled times in the Chapel Hill Transit system. Those two facets of the project still must be done in the shorter time period.

Kumar Neppalli, engineering services manager for Chapel Hill, said even though construction time will be cut in half, the amount of construction will be the same. He said the hours of road work will have to be extended to complete the project in time.

“The road workers will have both day-time and night-time work hours,” he said.

Erin Berg, a senior at UNC who lives off South Columbia Street, said the longer work hours could pose the main inconvenience .

“The longer construction will probably be more troublesome than the actual traffic issue,” she said.

Brian Litchfield, assistant transit director for Chapel Hill, said the construction will inconvenience commuters.

South Columbia Street sees on average 600 public transit trips throughout the day from the nine different bus routes that will be affected — the D, J, NS, V, CCS, CPX, JFX, JN and PX routes.

“There will still be serious short-term impacts on Chapel Hill Transit,” he said. “During the three-month period, citizens will see a longer wait for transit.”

But Carolyn Elfland, UNC’s associate vice chancellor for campus services, said the timeframe change will lessen the overall inconvenience of the project.

“Since, the construction is cut in half, the inconvenience for the citizens using the busses will be subsequently cut in half too,” Elfland said.

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