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A Carolinas Road Meet Preview

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Bob Malme and I did a brief road trip today to scout for the upcoming Carolinas Road Meet on Saturday, May 31.

The meet will be featuring a tour of the soon to be completed US 70 Clayton Bypass. The bypass will carry US 70 around one of the more congested areas of the triangle, the town of Clayton. It will run from Interstate 40 at milemarker 310 to the current US 70/US 70 Business split west of Smithfield and Selma. Besides the two interchanges at the bypass' terminal points (I-40 and US 70 Business) there will also be diamond interchanges with NC 42 and Ranch Road.

The meet will be held at the Cleveland Draft House on NC 42 in Garner at 12:30 PM on Saturday, May 31st. The group will meet up for lunch and then head on a tour of the Clayton Bypass and perhaps a few other items. We should be done around 3:30-4 pm.

If you are interested in going to the meet, just send me an e-mail.

Since I usually never get around to taking photos the day of the meet, here are some photos from the trip today:

Overhead signs at the Western Terminus of the Clayton Bypass at Interstate 40.

Looking eastbound on US 70. The NC 42 interchange is ahead.

Line painting is taking place on soon to be US 70 East at Exit 326 - US 70 Business (The eastern terminus of the bypass)

A closer view of the Exit 326 overhead.

You'd think that the 55 mph speed limit sign here on Cole Road would have been removed.

Pretty soon this 'End' sign for US 70 Business won't be needed as it will continue west from here on the former mainline of Highway 70.
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Bob Malme said…
Was glad to join in on the Meet scouting. Other items of note: According to NCDOT, the Bypass is more than 98% complete, so it's possible it could be open by the Meet. The fact that they were working on line striping on a Saturday shows there is an urgency to get the job done. They were almost finished with the eastbound side, and had not started westbound. All the US 70 signage on the route to be bypassed had hidden business banners installed. There also covered over US 70 signs on I-40, hopefully with the right directional banners.

Speaking of incorrect banners, the BGSs going east on I-40 still had not been corrected; with hidden 'Business' labels over the East US 70 signage, instead of over west 70. Hopefully this will not delay the project opening and they will notice to fix it at a prior time.
5:01 PM
Bob Malme said…
I've put up some photos that help illustrate some of my comments in the previous post at:
http://www.duke.edu/~rmalme/
masshighway.html

Don't let the name fool you, the NC photos are toward the bottom, below the Mass. photos. They include a Jones Sausage Road sign photo as well.
5:57 PM
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