Although it’s nearly 40 years old, the main road winding through Goose Creek State Park didn’t have an official name all those years.
Now it does.
The Beaufort County Board of Commissioners, during its Sept. 9 meeting, unanimously voted to name the road. Its official moniker is State Park Drive.
Park Superintendent John Fullwood, who attended that meeting, requested the road be named. He said naming the road would make it easier for emergency-response personnel — law enforcement and emergency-medical service responders — to respond to emergencies in the park because the named road would be a part of the county’s E-911 system.
“We’re trying to get the road named to avoid any confusion with emergency responders or additional law enforcement if there’s an incident down in the park,” Fullwood said Friday. “We just chose State Park Drive, figuring there was no other State Park Drive in Beaufort County. Most people would automatically identify it being here. That seemed the simplest thing to do.”
John Pack, Beaufort County’s emergency-services director, agreed that giving the road an official name would help avoid confusion when it comes to sending emergency-response personnel to the park.
“It’s one of those things where clarity is much better for 911. The good thing is we’re redoing GIS (geographic information systems), and we’re going to readdress the entire county. So, it will all get picked up in the process in the next six months,” Pack said.
State law gives county commissioners to authority to name roads in their counties.