Three months of road construction at this busy Fort Mill highway is about to wrap up
It’s been three months, but paving work along a busy section of Sutton Road is just about complete.
Work on pedestrian ramps along Sutton in Fort Mill began July 21. Milling and roller compacted concrete work started Aug. 25. Work on the four-lane section and full-depth road patching in a two-lane section is scheduled for completion by Oct. 21.
“Final surface should be placed over 10 days following that,” said Brittany Harriot, spokesperson for the South Carolina Department of Transportation.
Final pavement markings and punch list work completion will happen in November.
The section of Sutton under construction is a busy one. It stretches from North Sutton at S.C. 160 West, by Baxter, south about halfway to where Sutton crosses I-77. The 2020-21 statewide pavement improvement program shows 1.24 miles of work on North Sutton.
State traffic count data for 2020 shows 9,400 vehicle trips per day at the impacted area of North Sutton. Market Street in Baxter shows 5,000 trips and the closest S.C. 160 stretch to the construction shows 30,200 daily trips. Transportation experts throughout the region say the COVID-19 pandemic skewed traffic count data heavily in 2020. All three of those sites recorded 300 to 500 fewer trips in 2020 than in 2019.
Traffic counts also, experts say, can dip or jump based on the start or completion of other nearby road projects that create new driving conditions.
There are several other recent or planned improvements that will impact the area near the North Sutton work. They include reconfiguration and widening at the Sutton, Spratt Street and Fort Mill Parkway intersection, adaptive traffic signals along S.C. 160 to improve traffic flow and an interchange reconfiguration at I-77 and S.C. 160.
SCDOT put a video together to show work at North Sutton. The work is tied into work in nearby Lancaster County.
“Sometimes projects are put together that involved multiple counties,” the resident construction engineer for Lancaster County said in the video. “This happens to be one of them.”
Lancaster County work includes two miles of pavement on Jim Wilson Road. Recent Lancaster County resurfacing includes Dahlia, Douglas and Rocky River roads, plus Gold Mine Highway.
SCDOT has a number of ongoing or planned area projects. Listed as under development are the massive I-77 interchange projects at S.C. 160 in Fort Mill and Carolina Panthers site in Rock Hill, plus a proposed roundabout at S.C. 161/U.S 321 and safety improvements at South Paraham and Campbell roads in York County. Lancaster County has safety improvement at U.S. 521 and North Corner Road, and at Rocky River and Taxahaw roads. There’s also bridge replacement on Camp Creek Road over Gills Creek.
SCDOT also has an online project viewer with the latest on dozens of bridge replacement, resurfacing, safety, widening, emergency repair and other projects across York, Lancaster and Chester counties.
