After the hit-and-run fatality on Duke Street in January there was much talk on the Trinity Park listserv that the proposed East End Connector would help with traffic on Duke and Gregson Streets. After reading The Herald-Sun story on it today and looking at the routes on the NCDOT Web site, I don’t think that’s going to happen.

Most of the traffic from the north that comes down Gregson in the morning comes from Duke Street north of I-85. I have no traffic stats but that’s the way the traffic flow looks to me in the morning. And the traffic coming from the south on Duke Street comes from the Durham Freeway mostly and heads to northern Durham County. So, that being the case, how is a connector from I-85 to US70 to NC 147 east of all of this going to help this problem?

If you live in northern Durham County and work in the RTP are you going to head north on I-85, then south on the East End Connector and then make a hard right turn to the west to NC 147 and then head south into the Park? I doubt it. You’re going to head straight down Gregson the way you’ve always done. And the same goes for when you’re heading home. If you live on the east side of Treyburn, are you going to go down Old Oxford Highway and zigzag around until you get down to I-85? Am I missing something here?

The biggest north-south problem in Durham, as I see it, is finding a way to get to The Streets at Southpoint if you live north of I-85, and the East End Connector will not even touch that problem. So, what is our $100 million going to get us? Just asking.