By Mollie Flowe
Neighbors in Trinity Park know that Duke and Gregson Streets are scary, with cars rocketing along the one way streets at breakneck speeds. A recent presentation at the regional Metropolitan Planning Organization showed that our concern is well-founded. A study of traffic and accident data showed that the Duke and Gregson one-way pair had the highest safety risk of the 22 street corridors analyzed. Since Covid and the East End Connector changed traffic habits, the volume of traffic on Duke and Gregson has been down, while car speeds are UP.
The city is currently in the process of designing a safer traffic pattern for Roxboro and Mangum. Like Gregson and Duke, the Roxboro-Mangum pair is owned by the NCDOT. The TPNA Traffic Committee continues to work to encourage city leaders to take the lead on making these streets safer, sooner. Two-way streets significantly slow car speeds, and thus are safer for pedestrians, cyclists, students walking to school, workers waiting for buses, and also for drivers!
In March, as the city budget process got rolling, the Traffic Committee sent a letter to all City Council members requesting these budget priorities:
- Fully fund all planning and design of the Roxboro and Mangum conversions in the current (FY24) budget.
- Fully fund the implementation of the Roxboro and Mangum conversions in the FY25 budget.
- Fully fund the design of Duke, Gregson and Vickers Streets between Club Boulevard and University Drive in the FY25 budget.
- Commit to full local funding for the implementation of Duke, Gregson and Vickers Streets in FY26.
- Begin immediately to work with NCDOT on transferring responsibility for Duke, Gregson and Vickers Streets from NCDOT to the City.
The budget process is nearly complete, but there is still time to reach out to City Council members at citycouncilonly@durhamnc.gov.
The Traffic Committee understands that the draft budget may push off funding for the design of a Duke/Gregson conversion into FY26. That is not soon enough! Waiting to convert these streets to a safer design means accepting years’ more wrecks and injuries.
GET INVOLVED
Have you seen the @RecklessRoxboro twitter feed? Interested in helping Trinity Park set up something similar for Duke and Gregson? Do you live on one of these streets and have a good spot to set up a traffic camera? Email timothy.dunn@duke.edu or mollieflowe@hotmail.com to connect with the TPNA Traffic Committee!
