From Staff Reports

ARDEN – A public hearing Oct.13 on state plans to widen Interstate 26 to six and eight lanes prompted several area residents to attend and voice their desire for relief from traffic congestion on the highway as soon as possible.

Stoney Baker said that he favor the project in southern Buncombe County and through the heart of Henderson County even though the wider road will “cut right through my house” on the south side of Fletcher.

Baker added that he is tired of hearing invasive traffic noise and the crunch of frequent accidents on I-26 near his home. What’s more, he said, there is just too much traffic on the four-lane highway.

Because a wreck near the Buncombe-Henderson line backed up I-26 traffic that very afternoon, Baker said it took him 45 minutes to drive the 21 miles from his job in Flat Rock to the meeting at Biltmore Baptist Church. “I’d say the more lanes the better,” he said.

The state Department of Transportation is proposing to widen I-26 to eight lanes from the I-26/I-40/I-240 interchange on the west side of Asheville south to the U.S. 25 interchange, Exit 44, on the south side of Fletcher.

In addtion, DOT would make I-26 six lanes from Exit 44 to Exit 54 in Flat Rock, where U.S. 25 heads southwest toward Greenville, S.C.

Construction of the eight-lane part of the project would begin in 2020. However, there is no money available for DOT’s long-range plan, which runs through 2025, for widening the remaining section from Fletcher to Flat Rock. The construction dates remain uncertain. Total cost of the entire project is estimated at $454.7 million.

DOT has said its preferred “hybrid” option — eight lanes for the northern half of the project, six lanes on the south side — would best serve the amount of traffic with the size of the road. 

DOT also has studied widening all 22 miles of the stretch of I-26 affected to eight lanes, widening the entire section to six lanes or taking no action.