DOT pushes Litchfield project back to 2028 as it reviews comments – Coastal Observer

DOT pushes Litchfield project back to 2028 as it reviews comments – Coastal Observer

A project to reconfigure traffic on Highway 17 in Litchfield has been delayed a year to give the state Department of Transportation time to figure out how it will address public concerns. DOT held a public meeting last month on the project that will eliminate left turns onto the highway in the area between Litchfield Beach and Litchfield Country Club and continued to take online comments through May 29. The meeting drew 400 people. “We got a lot of great feedback,” said Brett McCutchan, the area project manager for DOT. “We’re still sorting through those comments.” The $10 million project was scheduled to start in the 2027 fiscal year. That was moved last week to FY28, McCutchan said. “We are also conducting summer traffic counts along this corridor to verify some of the numbers we use,” he said. “We know summer traffic’s very heavy and it’s going to dictate some of the decisions moving forward.” McCutchan told the Grand Strand Area Transportation Study policy committee last week that it could take a couple of months before DOT and its consultants respond to the comments. “There’s a lot of comments, a lot of people that need to respond,” he said. “We’re going to take all that into account.” State Rep. Lee Hewitt, who chairs the policy committee, said he wants to make sure DOT addresses the concerns of residents in the project’s design, but also make sure that the $10 million remains allocated for Georgetown County projects rather than shifted elsewhere. “We’re seen that happen in all areas of the state,” Hewitt said. “We’ve got a lot of stuff we do want.” The GSATS policy committee approves federal funding for transportation projects in the region. The Litchfield project was among more than two dozen proposed in a study of the Highway 17 corridor on Waccamaw Neck completed in 2021. The study was approved by Georgetown County Council, which submitted the Litchfield project to GSATS for funding. Property owners at Litchfield Beach raised objections to losing their left turn onto the highway at Litchfield Drive. They would have to go north to Crooked Oak Drive, where a traffic signal is proposed, and make a U-turn to go south. Litchfield Country Club residents would lose their left turn at Country Club Drive, which many already avoid. They would have to go south to the YMCA, where traffic signals in the northbound lane of the highway would allow them to make a U-turn and go north. The Crooked Oak intersection would allow left turns onto the highway at the new signal. Traffic going south will be able to turn left at Litchfield Drive, where a traffic signal in the northbound lane will also allow traffic from Litchfield Beach to enter the highway. Hewitt said most of the comments he received – which he told people they needed to send to DOT via its portal – were about the U-turns and the impact of the changes on golf cart traffic from the country club to the beach. Only one comment favored the proposal, he said. Most of those opposed to the plan didn’t offer an alternative, but those who did suggested a bridge over the Intracoastal Waterway is needed to reduce traffic passing through the Waccamaw Neck. “You can’t just go build a bridge,” Hewitt said. “You’re talking about billions of dollars.” GSATS actually has that project on its long-range plan, where it has been since the 1990s. A consultant is preparing an environmental impact statement for the Army Corps of Engineers on potential routes. For the Litchfield project, Hewitt expects to see revisions presented to the public. “I’ve got to wait for them to bring back the comments to the comments,” he said. While GSATS doesn’t have final say over how the projects it funds are built, “we can make sure they address all the comments,” Hewitt said. Like many of his constituents, he has questions about the “low conflict intersection” design that replaces left turns with U-turns. Examples from North Carolina and Mount Pleasant are on roads with different conditions. The intersections are designed to reduce the number right-angle collisions, which cause serious injuries.  “The traffic is a lot more congested on Waccamaw Neck than the areas they’re using as examples,” he said. “We’ve got congestion. There’s really not an easy fix to congestion.” In 2024, GSATS adopted a “congestion management process” to measure the impact transportation projects have on travel time.  “It’s a very heavy data analysis looking at congestion,” said Tom Dobrydney, a planner at Waccamaw Regional Council of Governments, which provides staff for GSATS. Of the 25 most congested highway corridors in the region, only one is in Georgetown County: Bypass 17 in Murrells Inlet. Between 2019 and 2024, the delay in that corridor increased from 35.6 seconds to 57.6 seconds. On Highway 707 between Socastee and Murrells Inlet, the delay increased by nearly 68 seconds, the worst in the region. The most improved corridor was a section of Highway 501 between Myrtle Beach and Conway. Travel time decreased by 43 seconds. That prompted a few wry looks from the committee members. “We’re going to have to work with what we have,” Dobrydney said. He is compiling current data on congestion because the license for the service that provides the data expires at the end of the year and DOT won’t renew it, he said.