Skip to main content

A Carolinas Road Meet Preview

Image
By
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.
Labels:

Comments

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
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

I-40 rockslide uncovers old debates on highway

By
The Asheville Citizen-Times continues to do a great job covering all the angles of the Interstate 40 Haywood County rock slide. An article in Sunday's edition provides a strong historical perspective on how the Pigeon River routing of Interstate 40 came about. And perhaps most strikingly, in an article that ran just prior to the highway's opening in the fall of 1968, how engineers from both Tennessee and North Carolina warned "...that slides would probably be a major problem along the route for many years." On February 12, 1969, not long after the Interstate opened, the first rock slide that would close I-40 occurred. Like many other Interstates within North Carolina, Interstate 40 through the mountains has a history prior to formation of the Interstate Highway System and was also a heated political battle between local communities. The discussion for a road that would eventually become Interstate 40 dates back to the 1940's as the idea for interregional high
2 comments
Read more

Mines Road

By
Mines Road is an approximately twenty-eight-mile highway located in the rural parts of the Diablo Range east of the San Francisco Bay Area.  Mines Road begins in San Antonio Valley in Santa Clara County and terminates at Tesla Road near Livermore of Alameda County.  The highway essentially is a modern overlay of the 1840s Mexican haul trail up Arroyo Mocho known as La Vereda del Monte.  The modern corridor of Mines Road took shape in the early twentieth century following development of San Antonio Valley amid a magnesite mining boom.  Part 1; the history of Mines Road Modern Mines Road partially overlays the historic corridor used by La Vereda del Monte (Mountain Trail).  La Vereda del Monte was part of a remote overland route through the Diablo Range primarily used to drive cattle from Alta California to Sonora.  The trail was most heavily used during the latter days of Alta California during the 1840s. La Vereda del Monte originated at Point of Timber between modern day Byron and Bre
Post a Comment
Read more

Former California State Route 41 past Bates Station

By
When California State Route 41 was commissioned during August 1934 it was aligned along the then existing Fresno-Yosemite Road north of the San Joaquin River.  Within the Sierra Nevada foothills of Madera County, the original highway alignment ran past Bates Station via what is now Madera County Road 209, part of eastern Road 406 and Road 207.   Bates Station was a stage station plotted during the early 1880s at what was the intersection of the Coarsegold Road and Stockton-Los Angeles Road.   The modern alignment bypassing Bates Station to the east would be reopened to traffic during late 1939.   Part 1; the history of California State Route 41 past Bates Station Bates Station was featured as one of the many 1875-1899 Madera County era towns in the May 21, 1968, Madera Tribune .  Post Office Service at Bates Station is noted to have been established on November 23, 1883 and ran continuously until October 31, 1903.  The postal name was sourced from Bates Station owner/operator George Ba
Post a Comment
Read more