A busy street in downtown Lumberton will get some major upgrades.
The N.C. Department of Public Transportation plans to make improvements along a 2.1-mile stretch of Second Street between Roberts Avenue and Martin Luther King Jr. Drive.
A preliminary design calls for wider sidewalks, new crosswalk markings and signs, and the installation of pedestrian “refuge” islands. But officials want to hear from local residents before finalizing plans, said NCDOT spokesperson Andrew Barksdale.
The department will host a public meeting to gather feedback from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. Thursday, March 26, at East Lumberton Baptist Church, 201 Old Whiteville Road.
The project, dubbed SAFE Lumberton, is expected to cost $9.5 million, Barksdale said. NCDOT plans to use money it received from a federal grant through the Rebuilding American Infrastructure with Sustainability and Equity (RAISE) program.
Funding distributed through the program is meant to support low-income communities with projects that connect central locations. The goal is to reduce vehicle speeds, add safety pedestrian features, and increase visibility for drivers.
“We were trying to figure out different ways to tap into the federal money to help communities with unique needs,” Barksdale said. “This is a project that probably would be harder to fund in the normal scheme of things.”
The state included Second Street in a pedestrian safety study in 2021.
Heavy foot traffic, along with Hurricane Matthew in 2016 and Hurricane Florence in 2018, damaged sidewalks and the road, said Brandon Love, Lumberton’s deputy city manager.
The Lumberton City Council supports the project, which Love said will make it easier for pedestrians to get to the downtown plaza, the Robeson County Public Library, and the Exploration Station children’s museum.
“We recognized ages ago that we needed to help the pedestrians with some protected crosswalks,” he said. “We’ve got places where sidewalks are either deteriorated or in bad shape, or maybe they just don’t even exist. We need to connect the dots, so to speak, between existing sidewalks and areas where they’re missing.”
Residents can also submit feedback about the project online. Email 2ndstreet-improvements-robeson@publicinput.com, or call 984-205-6615.
Barksdale said construction could begin in about a year.