Recent crashes near Laney, Trask schools signal need for changes to North College Road
Traffic congestion, a string of pedestrian-involved vehicle crashes and two schools not designed for an increasing population, have created a situation where North College Road is struggling to meet the demands of a growing area.
For instance, earlier this year in separate incidents, two students were struck while crossing the road and one suffered severe injuries.
New Hanover County Schools has been working to improve pedestrian safety and alleviate the congestion around the two schools, said Eddie Anderson, assistant superintendent of operations.
But the ultimate solution might require upgrading the infrastructure to match the area's growth.
The school district has worked with the N.C. Department of Transportation to improve signage and pavement markings on school grounds, install high-visibility crosswalks as well as stop signs and stop bars, and erect fencing to better control traffic, Anderson said. But the school system is limited in what it can do because North College Road is a state-maintained road.
“I think anybody that drives that road on a daily basis and sees the amount of traffic on it can recognize that it needs to be widened,” Anderson said.
New Hanover County’s population grew by 11% between 2010 and 2020, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.
More recently, between April 2020 and July 2022, New Hanover County’s population grew by roughly 4%, the seventh largest increase of any county in North Carolina during that time period, according to data from the U.S. Census Bureau.
More: 2020 Census: Bucking national trends, Wilmington area records double-digit growth
With that growth in population comes congestion on area roads, said Scott James, transportation planning engineer at the Wilmington Urban Area Metropolitan Planning Organization.
Congestion and increased travel time are an immediate sign that a road no longer meets its intended purpose, James said. Another sign is concerns about pedestrian safety.
It’s difficult for government agencies to upgrade roads ahead of growth, or even to keep up with demand, James said. Oftentimes, government agencies are playing catch up more so than anything else, James said.
In this case, New Hanover County Schools has been working on pedestrian safety and traffic upgrades at Laney and Trask since 2018. While the district has made some progress, there are still some projects the school system wants to complete.
Long term New Hanover County Schools wants to add more driveways and traffic lanes within the Laney school grounds to provide more room for parents to queue when picking up or dropping off their student, Anderson said.
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“Looking to the future, the two biggest improvements would be if NCDOT makes some improvements to North College Road, and then second our long-range facility plan calls for the construction of a new middle school and the combining Trask and Laney into one campus. We would be dealing with the traffic for one school and not two.”
Currently, NCDOT doesn't have any funded or planned projects around Laney and Trask, said Jessi Leonard, a division traffic engineer at NCDOT.
NCDOT has identified the intersection of Long Ride Drive and North College Road, though, as an area that warrants a traffic signal and crosswalk, Leonard said.
Growth isn’t necessarily the issue because fewer cars are traveling on North College Road, Leonard said. Approximately 500 fewer vehicles are using North College Road in the area around Laney and Trask, according to traffic volume data from 2011 and 2021, which was the most recent year data was available.
Traffic statistics from 2021 might not be completely representative of a normal year because schools and travel were disrupted due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The only pedestrian project in that area currently is New Hanover County’s efforts to expand Wilmington’s Cross City Trail up and past the two schools.
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As planned, New Hanover County will build a multi-use path, starting at North College Road and Gordon Road and running all the way until Northchase Parkway, said Tara Duckworth, director of New Hanover County parks and gardens’ department. The path will start on the west side of North College Road, before crossing over at Murrayville Road to the Laney/Trask side of the street.
The project is in the planning stages with a completion date “a couple years away,” Duckworth said. The county is hoping to finish the multi-use path as NCDOT completes its expansion of Gordon Road, which is slated to begin construction in the summer of 2024.
“We’re constantly looking at ways to improve our sites,” Anderson said. “This is part of a bigger, more complex situation with the increased population in New Hanover County. Most of these schools didn’t have a traffic problem when they were built.”
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This article originally appeared on Wilmington StarNews: Recent crashes near Laney, Trask schools point to larger problems
