RALEIGH — Local drivers will lose the convenient use of a campus cut-through route starting Monday, when N.C. State University closes newly installed gates on Dan Allen Drive.

The half-mile road between Hillsborough Street and Western Boulevard will be closed to through traffic between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m. on weekdays, when NCSU classes are in session.

Dan Allen carries as many as 19,000 vehicles a day. The closure is intended to promote pedestrian safety and to ease traffic congestion that causes buses on seven campus Wolfline routes to run behind schedule.

The road will be closed on class days between Yarbrough Drive and Thurman Drive, which border the railroad track that splits the main campus.

The gates will open automatically for buses, emergency vehicles and campus service vehicles. When other drivers reach the closed gates, they will be able to drive out of the campus by looping back to Western Boulevard via Thurman Drive, or to Hillsborough Street via Yarbrough Drive.

Siceloff: 919-829-4527