Gateway Project specifics

[AginGreer]

Originally Posted by WhitewaterVol

In my view, one of the bigger flaws with this intersection is that they did not go ahead and redesign the Woodruff Road intersections while this project was underway. Both the Woodruff / I-85 and Woodruff / I-385 intersections are in dire need of improvement and it would have made a lot of sense to do that while traffic was already disrupted for this project. Doing it later will create yet another disruption and cost even more than doing it during this project. You could also add the Laurens Road / I-85 interchange, which features an outmoded, dangerous design.

Yes, this was indeed a big oversight. So what if the ramps are lengthened if the interchanges can't handle the volume of traffic.

I live north of the interchange so my views are skewed to that end, but right now the project is in its worst configuration for southbound 85 to 385/Woodruff. Having to wait until you pass the Roper Mountain Bridge to exit into a single lane causes a huge backup throughout the day, and has caused many many accidents as well. Opening the new exit lanes before Roper Mountain will be an enormous benefit to southbound 85 traffic.

[WhitewaterVol]

Originally Posted by AWP69

This. I also have been very unhappy with this problem. It takes me 10-20 minutes longer to get to that area on the weekends due to the traffic on Woodruff Road from both Roper Mountain or the Greenridge area. I used that exit regularly and it really as been a huge pain since it has been gone.





There are thousands of exits at large interstate intersections around the country that have handled this well. Surely it could have been done in a way that could have eliminated a short exit ramp here as well. I don't see this as a legitimate reason for having taken it away. I think the huge exit ramp from the I-385 to I-85 could have had a split off that feed into the now much larger ramp without even interfering with I-85 at all. There are ways it could have been done.

It could have been done but it would have likely required redesign of both Woodruff Road interchanges, which they scoped out of this project. There isn't a lot of space in that area to incorporate the required grade change between both ramps and both interstates.

I wish they would have kept this access and re-worked the Woodruff Road interchanges in the process. Now we have to hope that they will re-incorporate that access when the Woodruff Road interchanges are re-done but that is likely to be 10-15 years from now. Whenever it happens, it will cause another disruption of the traffic flow in this area and an additional expense. It would have been cheaper in the long run to fix it all at one time.