THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, April 14, 1995 TAG: 9504140429
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA
SOURCE: BY ANNE SAITA, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: POPLAR BRANCH LENGTH: Medium: 72 lines
Some Currituck County residents would like to see the state widen existing roads or start a ferry system to ease traffic congestion created by Outer Banks tourists.
Anything, they suggest, but a midcounty bridge in their back yard.
Even so, just about everyone at a Wednesday evening workshop on a proposed Currituck Sound span agreed with Charlotte Bunch of Poplar Branch when she said: ``It's coming.''
``It's not a matter of `if.' It's a matter of `where' and `when,' '' said carpenter Phil Kratzer, also of Poplar Branch, at the second of two public meetings this week on building a bridge between the county's mainland and Corolla. A similar hearing was held Tuesday in Corolla.
More than 100 people came to W.T. Griggs Elementary School's media center in Poplar Branch during the three-hour session. Most had attended a similar program last year.
Some came to learn more specifics; others, to make another pitch to scrap the plan altogether.
``I can't do anything about canceling the project,'' Project Manager John Page repeatedly told people, most of whom live in areas that could be affected by a span across the 5-mile-wide Currituck Sound.
``I'd rather deal with the traffic than have concrete pillars on my property,'' said Bunch, who also owns property in Aydlett.
Officials with the state Department of Transportation are studying nine options for a bridge route, including some versions created after previous public discussions.
``This time we're bringing more specifics, and we are still hearing many of the concerns about the bridge that we heard last time - and we will continue to hearthem,'' said Page, an employee of Parsons Brinckerhoff Quade & Douglas Inc.
The Raleigh-based consulting firm was hired by the state to do a midcounty bridge study.
Many citizens believe the bridge will intrude on the bucolic lifestyle they bought into when they settled in Waterlily, Aydlett and Poplar Branch - targets for a mainland terminus.
``That is why people live down here, to get away from it all,'' said Amie Burgess. She and her husband, Pat, left Virginia Beach a year ago to live with their two children in an old schoolhouse in Aydlett.
Many property owners at Tuesday's Corolla meeting also worried that a new bridge would bring more people and problems in the burgeoning beach community.
Others insisted the bridge is needed for emergency evacuation. Traffic can back up for hours along two-lane North Carolina Route 12 during hurricane warnings.
Most non-bridge alternatives - including expanding U.S. Route 158 and other Outer Banks thoroughfares, or offering a state ferry system - would be more costly than a bridge, which is expected to run between $49.3 million and $71.3 million, Page said.
Alternate plans also would be less effective in reducing traffic, he added.
Jerry Wright, a farmer and former county commissioner, was one of a minority of mainlanders Wednesday who supported the bridge.
``I'm pro-bridge because I think, long-term, it's the only way the county can provide adequate services,'' he said.
It also will unite the two Currituck County communities, he said. ``Right now, basically, Corolla is tied into Dare County.''
Page said the bridge study team will hold a third public workshop next year.
``We've got a lot to look at,'' he said. by CNB