Road construction is set for York County highways big and small. Here’s where.
Roads throughout York County have work coming.
The South Carolina Department of Transportation announced a public comment period on Monday for changes to its statewide transportation improvement plan. Updates to the safety program intersection, road safety audits and pedestrian road safety audits lists include two projects in York County.
A $2.3 million improvement at Paraham and Campbell roads in Lake Wylie would have construction funding allocated in fiscal year 2022. Funding for almost $2.4 million work at Anderson and Spencer Hall roads in Rock Hill would come the following year.
The statewide program is more than $66.8 million worth of improvements. Funding plans are to engineer the projects in 2020-21, acquire right-of-way in 2021-22 and construct them in 2021-23. Comments can be submitted online or mailed to Ms. Viola Covington, 955 Park St., P.O. Box 191, Columbia, SC 29202 through June 22.
Also on Monday, the City of Tega Cay put information online updating residents there on road projects of interest. That work includes:
▪ A left turn lane onto Zoar Road and four S.C. 160 West lanes to the North Carolina state line should be complete by September.
▪ A diverging diamond at Gold Hill Road and I-77 should be complete by June 2021.
▪ More turn lane capacity and an intersection improvement at Carowinds Boulevard and Pleasant Road could see construction begin in spring 2021.
▪ Hubert Graham Way extension to Dry Run Road is in right-of-way acquisition.
▪ Design is underway for intersections at Sutton and New Grey Rock roads, and Sam Smith and Harris roads.
▪ The interchange at S.C. 160 and I-77 could see construction late next year, with completion in 2024.
Several of those Tega Cay-area projects were discussed during a virtual Rock Hill-Fort Mill Area Transportation Study meeting on May 28. At that meeting, other project updates were given.
David Hooper, RFATS director, spoke of concern with some projects set for widening in South Carolina where there aren’t matching plans for the same roads in North Carolina. The S.C. 160 West project in Tega Cay and U.S. 521 in Indian Land are examples where a road could be widened to help traffic, but then narrow sharply as it crosses the state line.
“There probably will be some operational dysfunction, or disruption, that follows,” Hooper said.
Several Fort Mill projects came up, too. Mayor Guynn Savage said she hears concern about the intersection near Riverview Elementary School, where Fort Mill Parkway comes to Spratt Street. She was told that work should be advertised for construction bids this fall.
Pennies for Progress, the voter-approved county sales tax used to fund road work, also has work planned for Whites Road. Savage said she gets complaints about pavement conditions there. Whites Road is the only resurfacing job from the most recent Pennis campaign that hasn’t been bid yet.
Patrick White, Pennies director, told the RFATS group that move was intentional. There are multiple school sites in the Whites Road and Fort Mill Parkway area under construction now.
“We did not want to go in and pave a brand new road, and have construction go in and tear it up,”
At the May 28 virtual meeting, Hamilton told the group some work would be visible on Whites Road and Fort Mill Parkway in the next week or two. Whites Road will be paved in 2021.
