In the summer of 2016, few people, other than Washington officials and N.C. Department of Transportation personnel knew details about the proposed 15^th Street improvement project. From summer to early December, more and more people became aware of those details, with many of those people opposed to the project as proposed by DOT.

Those people began showing up at City Council meetings and Planning Board meetings. As the months passed, their numbers grew, as did their opposition to the $16 million project. A standing-room-only crowd at a Dec. 8 meeting about the proposed project resulted in not one speaker voicing support for the project. Some people wanted it modified, but others wanted the project to be scrapped altogether.

At its Dec. 12 meeting, the City Council unanimously rejected the 15^th Street project as currently proposed by DOT. The council’s decision was met by applause by some audience members.

“We sat here last Thursday night and heard some 25 people address this council saying, ‘We’re opposed to this project.’ I have had any number of phone calls and personal contacts over the last two or three weeks about this project, and I have not had a single positive remark. … Based on the comments we heard, I’d like to make a motion that this council go on record as opposing the project in its present form and instruct the manager to convey that opposition to DOT,” Councilman Doug Mercer said at the Dec. 12 meeting.

City Manager Bobby Roberson said the decision to reject the project could have unintended consequences for the city. “From my perspective, I’m going to draft a letter and send it directly to NDCOT and tell them we’re not interested in improvements on 15^th Street. …Trust me, they’re not going to move up — I understand the public comment — when I send that letter, they will move on to another project. They will not be negotiating back and forth once I send that letter,” Roberson said. “I just want to be sure that’s exactly what the council wants. I’ll do what the council directs me to do, but I just want to be sure that’s what you folks want.”

Bill Kincannon, DOT’s resident engineer for its Division 2, weighed in on the council’s Dec. 12 vote.

“Well, the way these projects work is that we’re basically following the guidance we were given with the Beaufort County transportation plan, which all of the council met and approved previously,” he said. “We pretty much gave them precisely what they asked for. To change the project from that, from what was voted on by them, by the city and the county, for the RPO, we pretty much have to put together a different project.
Kincannon continued: “Once the town says they don’t want the project, (what they have to do) is to tell the RPO in a formal letter, telling them they don’t want to do the project, and we pull everything back. If they want any other project, they’ll basically have to start all over again. If they absolutely say they don’t want any part of the project, the project is going to come off the table.”

Kincannon said Roberson is “essentially correct” in his assessment that DOT will move on to another project now that the city rejected the 15^th Street project.

In August, the North Carolina Department of Transportation conducted an informational meeting about the project, which called for converting the existing multi-lane road into a four-lane, raised-median divided road. The project was designed to improve overall traffic flow and traffic safety. The project also included median breaks for left turns as traffic volumes warrant. U-turn locations will be provided at several locations.

Some residents and business owners along the project corridor opposed raised medians and other elements of the proposed project. Despite DOT modifications to the project, those residents and business owners remained unhappy with the project.

DOT spokesmen have said the project’s goal was to reduce the number of vehicles crashes on 15^th Street. Crashes on the western section of the project corridor occur about three times more frequently than crashes on similar roads in other areas of the state, according to DOT figures.