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McCrory's greatest accomplishment is the overhaul of how transportation projects are funded statewide.
He implement a scoring system that takes into account how a project benefits more than its immediate area.
It strikes a balance between addressing the urban area's needs and giving rural gas tax contributers something for what they pay into all their lives.
I think it's now time to give the state credit for the arduous task of trying to be fair to a very dispersed population across all 100 counties.
No more saying Raleigh gets preferential treatment, in fact, I think the opposite has happened with such pressure and scrutiny.
The Triangle has so many awful bottlenecks from the remaining 4-lane stretches of interstates, however Triangle residents know that resources must be spread across the state.
Charlotte folks, you have the top two scoring projects on top of the last decade's projects that undoubtedly focused on Charlotte.
McCrory's greatest accomplishment is the overhaul of how transportation projects are funded statewide.
He implement a scoring system that takes into account how a project benefits more than its immediate area.
It strikes a balance between addressing the urban area's needs and giving rural gas tax contributers something for what they pay into all their lives.
I think it's now time to give the state credit for the arduous task of trying to be fair to a very dispersed population across all 100 counties.
No more saying Raleigh gets preferential treatment, in fact, I think the opposite has happened with such pressure and scrutiny.
The Triangle has so many awful bottlenecks from the remaining 4-lane stretches of interstates, however Triangle residents know that resources must be spread across the state.
Charlotte folks, you have the top two scoring projects on top of the last decade's projects that undoubtedly focused on Charlotte.
So, McCrory was mayor or Charlotte and the system he put in place elevated top priority to two projects in Mecklenburg? Coincidence? I ask because I truly don't know.
Balancing needs and requirements of cities & countryside, along with the contributions to the coffers is a tricky thing, especially when one throws economic opportunity differences of these various places into the equation. Also, if you happen to be from the "wrong" political party, efforts that do so are met with cries of wealth redistribution and socialism.
McCrory's greatest accomplishment is the overhaul of how transportation projects are funded statewide.
He implement a scoring system that takes into account how a project benefits more than its immediate area.
It strikes a balance between addressing the urban area's needs and giving rural gas tax contributers something for what they pay into all their lives.
I think it's now time to give the state credit for the arduous task of trying to be fair to a very dispersed population across all 100 counties.
No more saying Raleigh gets preferential treatment, in fact, I think the opposite has happened with such pressure and scrutiny.
The Triangle has so many awful bottlenecks from the remaining 4-lane stretches of interstates, however Triangle residents know that resources must be spread across the state.
Charlotte folks, you have the top two scoring projects on top of the last decade's projects that undoubtedly focused on Charlotte.
I agree that the scoring system was one of the very few things McCrory did right, but why does everything have to be a Charlotte vs. Raleigh pissing contest with you?
If anything, eastern NC always got accused of preferential treatment, despite the fact that the most needed upgrades that are happening in ENC now (US-70/Future I-42 & US-117/I-795) should’ve been done 20 years ago.
So, McCrory was mayor or Charlotte and the system he put in place elevated top priority to two projects in Mecklenburg? Coincidence? I ask because I truly don't know.
Balancing needs and requirements of cities & countryside, along with the contributions to the coffers is a tricky thing, especially when one throws economic opportunity differences of these various places into the equation. Also, if you happen to be from the "wrong" political party, efforts that do so are met with cries of wealth redistribution and socialism.
The ranking system just means those projects will most likely receive funding allocated to each region during that time frame.The 77 rebuild is the only project left in Charlotte that would score that high & it wont add free capacity
I agree that the scoring system was one of the very few things McCrory did right, but why does everything have to be a Charlotte vs. Raleigh pissing contest with you?
If anything, eastern NC always got accused of preferential treatment, despite the fact that the most needed upgrades that are happening in ENC now (US-70/Future I-42 & US-117/I-795) should’ve been done 20 years ago.
You could very well add widening U.S. 17 and N.C. 24 in eastern North Carolina to that list of overdue work as well. Face it, the old patronage system of running the NCDOT to please the needs of legislators versus the state as a whole let us with plenty of misplaced priorities for decades where certain roads got more attention than they needed in comparison with others just to benefit local politicians and their followers.
You could very well add widening U.S. 17 and N.C. 24 in eastern North Carolina to that list of overdue work as well.
True. I think the last remaining 2-lane stretch of US-17 is between Vanceboro and Chocowinity. The remainder of the 2-lane section between Vanceboro and Bridgeton will eventually be bypassed whenever the remainder of the New Bern Bypass is built. As for NC-24, NCDOT is currently focused on the section between I-95 and I-40. It was recently widened between I-95 and Clinton, but it’s still 2-lanes between Clinton and I-40.
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Face it, the old patronage system of running the NCDOT to please the needs of legislators versus the state as a whole let us with plenty of misplaced priorities for decades where certain roads got more attention than they needed in comparison with others just to benefit local politicians and their followers.
Interesting. I definitely like the idea of trying to standardize some kind of ranking system that takes into account local, regional, and statewide impacts of different projects. There are always more demands than resources, so being able to somewhat objectively prioritize is important.
I find it odd that Durham and Orange counties are in different regions and different divisions. They are part of the same metro and are obviously very connected. Also find Wake and Johnston being in different counties odd. You obviously need to have dividing lines so sometimes adjacent counties will be in different divisions and regions, but to me the metro/economic connections of those divisions seems counter-intuitive. I would think they would be centered on the state's large metros and radiate outward.
No one has mentioned the worst part of how funds used to be allocated statewide.
A significant percentage of the yearly funding was divided EQUALLY among the divisions whether they needed it or not.
So you had a group of rural counties in the mountains or in Eastern NC receiving a chunk of money equal to what the divisions that included part or all of the biggest metros received.
Now granted this was only a portion of the total yearly funds allocated (counties receive more from different programs/ criteria).
But probably 30-39% of yearly funding was distributed equally to divisions comprised of counties not needing it, which delayed badly-needed improvements in the traffic-choked areas across the state.
For example back in 2006 my friend from Henderson took me to see what he called the first section of a loop around Henderson. All I remember was a beautiful, short 4-lane highway in the woods with no traffic. Now I may have gotten some of this wrong, but that's essentially what had been happening for decades.
Gov. McCrory totally stopped that portion being equally divided or it got reduced to less than 10%.
He didn't change some funding mechanisms such as the urban loop fund, which sets aside probably 7% annually to go into a pot that slowly brings a loop to the 10 worst traffic cities in the state, some are surprisingly small compared to the state's 5 biggest cities.
The scoring exercise I think is a fair way to prioritize deserving projects, and my hometown of Lousiburg which has been promised a 4-laning of US401 for 40 years, didn't score high enough to get funding for it's scheduled start date.
But thankfully DOT's revenue came in higher than expected and US401 did get funded to Louisburg and the first of two sections is underway.
If you look at the stats of I-77 through Charlotte over the last 20 years, you'd agree that it has been cheated with only 3 lanes each direction despite carrying 180,000 cars daily, more than, up until recently, I-40 in the Triangle which did get partially expanded.
And then looking at the I-85, I-77 interchange where the ramps almost turn completely back in the opposite direction they're so sharp, I don't suspect that McCrory had anything to do with the 2 top-scoring projects in the state.
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And regarding making it a Charlotte vs. Raleigh thing.....
It will forever perturb me how little Charlotte knows, embraces, & supports the rest of the state.
They make so many incorrect assumptions including how Raleigh's governing folks deliberately short-change Charlotte, or how no one lives in Eastern NC and the roads built there are unused, (FYI over 2.5 million people live East of I-95 in NC)…
They even complain about tiny sections of Fayetteville's loop being built which, they say, should have been spent on Charlotte. They don't bother to research to see that Fayetteville/Cumberland's metro population is 400,000+.
Then there's the time Charlotte local news sent reporters & a news truck to Raleigh to compare how how well the highway lighting was functioning as they were sure that all the highway lights would be working perfectly in contrast to the 70% not working on Charlotte interstates (which makes me mad at NCDOT).
What a wasted trip because Raleigh's freeway aren't lit at all! Except for maybe less than 10% are those were built after this attempt to catch 'em in the act of giving preferential treatment. So I bet they felt stupid for acting based on assumption only.
Every forum about Charlotte has the sentiment of "we are the big city in NC and the rest of the state is rural and irrelevant. We should get as much of the state resources as our never-satisfied ambitions dictate."
No other part of the state has this view of condescension toward the Great State of NC.
So I will always try to set the record straight, because I truly think NC tries to be fair to all 100 counties.
Last edited by architect77; 11-10-2018 at 11:41 PM..
As far as Charlotte getting an unfair advantage I’d say that’s a fallacy. I-77 between uptown and the SC line is only 3 lanes and the busiest stretch of highway in the state. It is long overdue on the expansion to 5 lanes in each direction. Besides, after 77 is upgraded throughout Mecklenburg County, Charlotte doesn’t have much of anything needed in terms of high priority roadway projects. 77 being upgraded would likely keep Charlotte traffic smooth for the next 30-40 years. As of right now it’s down right embarrassing to NC how 77 is 8 lanes through York County, SC and contracts to 6 lanes once you cross the N.C. state line. Probably the only case I’ve seen in a major metro where the highway has higher capacity in the suburbs than in the core city.
In N.C. the unfair advantage has traditionally been going to Eastern NC and the Greensboro area relative to population.
Charlotte sorely needs to upgrade Independence Boulevard to a freeway to the Monroe Toll Road.
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