The rebirth of an urban highway in NC is getting national attention
The transformation of one of North Carolina’s first stretches of interstate highway into a safer, more attractive and less obtrusive gateway into downtown Winston-Salem is up for another national award.
And this time the public gets to vote.
Last year, contractors for NCDOT finished rebuilding a 1.2-mile stretch of Interstate 40 Business that separates the city’s main business district from Old Salem, historic Salem Cemetery and the West Salem neighborhood. The highway, which opened as the first leg of I-40 in 1958, passed through a trench with gray concrete walls and frequent on and off ramps that kept the speed limit at 45 mph.
The road reopened last year as Salem Parkway, with new brick and stone walls and two new pedestrian bridges helping reconnect the city — one with decorative arches, the other, called a “land bridge,” with beds for plants and trees along the path. Some of the 10 new bridges over the highway include bike lanes, and there’s room for a planned multi-use path that will eventually parallel the parkway from downtown west to Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center.
There are also half as many interchanges, allowing NCDOT to increase the speed limit on the parkway to 55 mph.
NCDOT spent years planning the project with the city and a local citizens group, which together contributed $9.7 million toward the aesthetic touches and the pedestrian bridges. When drivers got to try it out for the first time last year, Mayor Allen Joines described the highway as “a wonderful front door for the city.”
The project won a national award from the American Council of Engineering Companies in August.
Now it’s one of 12 finalists in the America’s Transportation Awards competition, put on by the American Association of State Highway Transportation Officials, or AASHTO. The winner of that award will be chosen by popular vote; people can see the finalists and vote once a day through Oct. 29 at bit.ly/3v62sJp.
The project could win either the national Grand Prize or the People’s Choice Award, which each come with $10,000 for a charity or transportation-related scholarship of the winner’s choosing.
