In a Pinch, 460 Escape Route’s a Squeeze

By Tom Holden, The Virginian-Pilot, Norfolk, Va.

May 14–CHESAPEAKE — When Hurricane Isabel churned through Hampton Roads in 2003, Erik and Dina Jorgensen watched with alarm as winds pushed up whitecaps on their back yard lake, stripped trees bare and shook their house.

Isabel was a small storm by hurricane standards. But after that experience, if the Big One ever threatens their city, the Jorgensens say they’ll evacuate. “We just can’t be here for a Category 2 or higher,” Erik said.

In planning their escape, they settled on a route to Interstate 64 to Bowers Hill, then on to U.S. 460 and relative safety inland. But they encountered a problem.

U.S. 460 is a great evacuation route only if you can get there.

For the Jorgensens and tens of thousands of other South Hampton Roads residents, quickly reaching the highway may be impossible during a major hurricane. Bottling up their exodus is the 65-foot-tall High-Rise Bridge on I-64, which offers only two lanes of passage on a ordinary day.

“I would have to leave three days before because I could not make it out in two days,” said Erik Jorgensen, who lives in Hunningdon Lakes with his wife and their two teen age sons. “I would not want to be here.”

Long outdated and inadequate for ordinary rush-hour demands, the bridge over the S outhern B ranch of the Elizabeth River in Chesapeake regularly carries about 88,000 vehicles each day — 10,000 more than it was designed to handle.

During a major evacuation, as many as 96,000 vehicles a day, or about 4,000 an hour, would be attempting to cross the bridge.

Should a vehicle break down on or near the bridge — a scenario that planners consider a virtual certainty given the volume of cars — traffic would come to a standstill. There are no shoulders for disabled vehicles.

When sustained tropical-force winds of 45 mph or more settle over the bridge — again, a likely probability — the High-Rise would be shut down, according to the Virginia Department of Transportation’s hurricane evacuation plan.

The problems are a major reason VDOT officials want to build a new bridge. With another six -month hurricane season beginning June 1, it might seem that VDOT would be working on doing just that.

But it’s not.

Instead, state officials are working on U.S. 460 — a lightly traveled four-lane highway several miles to the west of the High-Rise.

Within the last year, the Commonwealth Transportation Board has moved forward with plans to rebuild the highway while taking no action to begin major work on I-64 and the High-Rise, beyond the improvements under way at Battlefield Boulevard.

Among the key decisions on 460, the board has:

— Selected an alignment for a new, four-lane divided highway that has fewer interchanges and runs roughly parallel to the existing 460.

— Accepted a draft environmental impact statement, an essential document needed before VDOT and the Federal Highway Administration can take further steps.

— Named a review panel to consider proposals from three groups of construction companies to build a new highway from the Bowers Hill interchange to Petersburg.

The generally accepted construction cost is about $1.5 billion. No date has been set for when work could begin on 460. For residents like Jorgensen, that’s discouraging.

“I just hope that we don’t get hit with a big one because it’s going to be a mess,” said Jorgensen, the owner of a custom woodworking business.

The 460 project has leaped ahead in planning over the High-Rise partly because of how Virginia officials want to pay for the projects. The rebuilding of 460 is envisioned as one that can be financed with a mix of public and private money, while the High-Rise project, estimated to cost $1 billion, would be paid for largely with state and federal dollars.

State funding for new interstate construction is at its lowest level in decades and only recently received a boost that could result in more interstate projects moving into design and construction phases.

“It is simply not possible to undertake all of the major interstate projects that are necessary in Hampton Roads at this time,” said Transportation Secretary Pierce Homer. “We have to start somewhere, and that starting point is 460.”

Transportation officials say the High-Rise isn’t the only evacuation option. The Gilmerton Bridge, which crosses the S outhern B ranch of the Elizabeth River along South Military Highway, also is part of the region’s evacuation strategy.

But it’s a shaky option. The Gilmerton has undergone extensive repairs, but engineers still post weight limits for trucks and heavy vehicles.

“We’re talking about a bridge that was built in 1938,” said Eric Martin, Chesapeake’s chief engineer. “It is past its normal life expectancy. The steel on it is corroding. We have done many repairs to sections of deck. “

Asked if the bridge would be a safe alternative for evacuating Hampton Roads, Martin said, “It’s certainly safe for cars.”

Replacing the Gilmerton will cost $133 million, according to Martin’s office, and the city is about $40 million short of the money needed to start work.

If an evacuation becomes necessary — usually with the threat of a Category 3 hurricane or stronger — Virginia Beach could take 26 hours to evacuate; Chesapeake could take 11 hours, not including the expected influx from North Carolina’s tourist -laden Outer Banks. Such lengthy delays in clearing densely populated areas are a main reason why state planners want a series of improvements to the region’s interstates.

“We need the High-Rise Bridge, the interchange in Bowers Hill and 460 to all move forward at roughly the same pace,” said Dwight Farmer, deputy executive director for transportation at the Hampton Roads Planning District Commission. “If you get them out of sync, you will lose the cost-effectiveness of the projects.”

Stephany D. Hanshaw, manager of VDOT’s Smart Traffic Center, thinks the congestion on the High-Rise can be managed during a crises. But he acknowledged that the current road system’s ability to handle a full-blown evacuation is worrisome.

“We can take steps to spread the demand out so we don’t have a major bottleneck, but that becomes much more difficult at Bowers Hill because you have multiple interstates coming into that area,” he said.

The convergence of Interstates 64 and 664 with U.S. 58 and local roads in western Chesapeake will require careful control of traffic flow — even it’s moving slowly.

“I don’t believe it will be unmanageable, but it will be critical,” he said. Like a funnel, he said, “You can pour much more into it than you can get out in the same time.”

Few engineers argue against improving 460.

The road is antiquated. Drainage ditches run along much of its length. Lane widths vary from 10 to 11 feet — short of the 12-foot modern standard.

Its undivided design has led to a disproportionately high number of accidents, often involving trucks and cars, according to the draft environmental impact statement.

And then there are the floods.

At its juncture with the Blackwater River, the highway has been closed to traffic four times in the last seven years: for Hurricane Floyd in 1999, when nine feet of water closed the road for a week; for a nor’easter in 2006, and twice when storms damaged drainage culverts.

For all its problems, 460 has one plus: I t’s fairly uncongested.

At its busiest interchange, where 460 joins Va. 616 in Ivor, the average daily traffic count was 11,100 in 2003, according to the draft environmental impact statement.

By comparison, the Downtown Tunnel, the region’s most congested crossing, is used by an estimated 96,000 vehicles every day. Portions of Interstate 64 at the interchange with I-264 carry 220,000 vehicles daily, according to the planning commission figures.

Art Collins, executive director of the Planning District Commission, said the 460 project should be in the region’s long-range transportation plan because the highway addresses future needs in Hampton Roads.

“One of those needs was hurricane evacuations and the need to connect this cul-de-sac with the rest of the world,” Collins said.

Del. Leo Wardrup, R-Virginia Beach, the outgoing chairman of the House Transportation Committee, has long supported improvements to 460.

“It troubles me that we could be trapped in this cul-de-sac in the event of a disaster,” he said. “The next question is, what’s the best course of action?

“If the only thing we can work on is 460 because that project is the furthest along, then that does not bother me,” he said. Would I like to see work on I-64 south side? Sure.

“Would I like to see work on Bowers Hill? Sure, but it’s a matter of priority.”

— Reach Tom Holden at (757) 446-2331 or tom.holden@pilotonline.com.

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Copyright (c) 2007, The Virginian-Pilot, Norfolk, Va.

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

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