ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Tuesday, May 28, 1996 TAG: 9605290100
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: B6 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: GREG EDWARDS AND JEFF STURGEON STAFF WRITERS
HOLLINS ROAD, the one that leads past Hanover Direct Inc.'s mail-order warehouse toward rapidly growing south Botetourt County, is about to be improved. Great news for Hanover Direct. Not for Wayne Holley.
Wayne Holley wishes Roanoke County planners and the Virginia Department of Transportation had hollered "fore" a little louder before he opened his business near the intersection of Plantation and Hollins roads two years ago.
Holley, owner of the Big Lick Golf Driving Range and Learning Center, sunk his life savings into the fancy driving range and golf-teaching operation.
He was a club pro at the Roanoke Country Club for 25 years until opening his business in May 1991. Now, he's discovered that the county and VDOT have preliminary plans to widen to five lanes the stretch of Virginia 601 - Hollins Road - in front of the property he leased for his business.
If conceptual plans are carried out for widening and improving the road - which leads northeast past Hanover Direct Inc.'s mail-order warehouse toward rapidly growing south Botetourt County - the new construction would wipe out Holley's clubhouse, parts of a tee area and putting green and 70 percent of his parking lot.
"I'd have never started if I'd known anything about this," Holley said looking at preliminary state drawings of the proposed project. He has postponed plans to erect lights for night practice until he finds out what's going to happen with the road.
Holley's biggest problem is that he doesn't own the land. If the state condemns it for the road, the proceeds will go to the property owner, an estate trust administered by First Union Bank. To recover his business investment, Holley said he would have to sue the owner.
Holley said last week he had collected 1,600 names on petitions opposing road work that would destroy his business. He made a pitch for signatures during a golf clinic last Thursday and 50 more people signed the petition, he said.
Arnold Covey, director of engineering and inspections for Roanoke County, said the county understands Holley's predicament and will do everything it can to minimize the impact of the road project on the business.
A clearer picture of the road plans will be available in June or July when they go before a public hearing, Covey said.
Plans to improve Hollins Road have been on the county's secondary road construction plan for 12 to 14 years. The plan is updated by VDOT and the County Board of Superivsors every two years following a public hearing.
Holley said the county told him it had plans to improve the road by adding lanes when he sought permits for his own driving-range and clubhouse construction. He said, however, that he expected VDOT might widen the road to three lanes along the same route as the existing road.
As it turned out, Holley had one kind of driving range in mind and the county and VDOT quite another.
Although improvement of Hollins Road was in VDOT's plans for some time, the arrival of Hanover Direct caused officials to take another look at what type of road improvements would be made, Covey said. Hanover Direct, one of the nation's largest mail-order merchants, opened a 539,000-square-foot warehouse and distribution center on the road last fall.
Work began on the preliminary study - which calls for making the road five-lanes from Plantation Road as far as the Tinker Creek bridge and then building three lanes to the Hanover Direct entrance, a combined distance of less than a mile - only about a year to a year and a half ago.
The projected cost of the new road, including the 5-lane section, and bridge is $4.7 million, Hodge said. Construction on whatever plan is agreed to would begin in the fall of 1997 or spring of 1998.
Millions of dollars can be saved by building the road and bridge on a new path, Covey said, because traffic, which can use the old road, would not conflict with construction work.
LENGTH: Medium: 79 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: 1. ARNE KUHLMANN STAFF When Wayne Holley (right) sankby CNBhis life savings into the Big Lick Golf Driving Range and Learning
Center, he had no idea the improvements to Hollins Road would wipe
out his clubhouse, parts of a tee area and putting green and 70
percent of his parking lot. color
2. Plans would widen the road (below) to five lanes. color
3. map showing location of driving range color STAFF