
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, June 1, 1995                   TAG: 9506010069
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C-1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: RAY REED
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

WHERE'S ALL THAT TRAFFIC HEADED?

Q: My husband and I wonder about traffic after the Peters Creek Road Extension is built and after Brandon Avenue is widened from Mud Lick Road to Keagy Road. Will the city widen the rest of Brandon from Mud Lick to Main Street, a heavily residential area? If not, where do they think the traffic that gets dumped out on Brandon will go?

B.B., Roanoke

A: They think the traffic will go west.

And, no, there are no plans to widen the close-to-town part of Brandon Avenue in the next 20 years.

Bob Bengtson, the city's traffic engineer, says the traffic that wants to use your section of Brandon, in the Grandin Road vicinity, already is getting there.

These determined drivers use Virginia 419 or the Shaffers Crossing-Bridge Street-Edgewood Street corridor to travel between Northwest and Southwest Roanoke.

Traffic on this section of Brandon in 1994 was about 21,000 vehicles a day. Twenty years from now, the city figures, this part will carry 25,000 per day - an increase of 20 percent spread over 20 years.

The real growth is coming on the west end of Brandon.

When Peters Creek Road Extension is opened in late 1997, Bengtson expects traffic on Brandon to jump from the 20,000 per-day range to 30,000 almost immediately.

In another 20 years, he says, that part of Brandon will be carrying 57,000 vehicles a day - an increase of nearly 200 percent.

The Brandon corridor entering Salem, with five traffic lanes, also can expect a lot of development, city officials say.

Gaston water supply

Q: The 60 million gallons of water that could be transferred daily from Lake Gaston to Virginia Beach sounds like a lot of water, but is it? How does this compare to the use of Carvins Cove in Roanoke?

B.P., Martinsville

A: Roanoke counts on Carvins Cove for 20 million gallons a day, said Craig Sluss, manager of the Water Department.

That amount supplies 159,000 residents of the city and Roanoke County, plus a few people in Bedford and Botetourt counties and Vinton.

The Lake Gaston pipeline to Virginia Beach would carry three times more water than Roanoke uses.

Southeastern Virginia, all of which would get a boost from the pipeline, has a population of nearly 1 million. Virginia Beach alone has 393,000 people.

Yes, 60 million gallons a day is a lot of water. It's also a small percentage of the Roanoke River's flow through Lake Gaston.

Got a question about something that might affect other people, too? Something you've come across and wondered about? Give us a call at 981-3118. Maybe we can find the answer.

by CNB