ROANOKE, Va. – VDOT wants to hear from you when it comes to Route 419, Electric Road, between Starkey Road and Springwood Park Drive in Roanoke County.
You can take a survey now until June 16. The survey’s main purpose is to reduce congestion and make that stretch of road safer for drivers, cyclists and pedestrians.
“Route 419 is certainly one of our more congested corridors in the area, and there have been quite a few improvements along 419, particularly in the Tanglewood area, as we are looking at additional areas along 419 to make potential improvements,” said VDOT Spokesperson Jason Bond.
Bond said this is the fifth study for Starkey Road and Springwood Park Drive.
“The next step would be once we hear from people, we would go develop some solutions based on what issues people are reporting in the survey and what we are collecting as far as information about safety and traffic flow along that corridor. And then we would develop some potential solutions, share those again with the public, and then provide that information to the county for them to decide what they might want to pursue as far as funding for improvements,” said Bond.
Some of the questions on the survey are what time you experience congestion, what mobility issues you have, such as difficulty when walking or making left turns, and whether sidewalks, crosswalks, and park and ride lots need to be added.
10 News spoke with several of you about your concerns.
Many people outside the shopping center, where Duck Donuts, Subway, Pizza Hut, and Sherwin-Williams Paint Store are located, said it can get pretty congested in that area.
“Right here, I’ve seen a lot of people get t-boned because they think that people in that one lane are gonna turn and they don’t. So, maybe putting some sort of light there would be good,” said Rigdon.
Other people have suggested other solutions to help ease the flow of traffic.
“I don’t know if adding like an extra lane would help or another bypass kind of thing because a lot of your traffic comes through here, but I don’t know if they can do a bypass,s but that would probably help,” said Brittany Underwood.
VDOT is looking to make improvements along with other parts of 419.
Currently, they are working on a diverging diamond interchange on Routes 419 and 220, which is estimated to be completed in 2028.
As part of the project, VDOT is also planning on modifying three intersections along Route 419. Those intersections are Ogden Road, Elm View Road, and South Peak Boulevard.
VDOT says about 40,000 cars travel in that area every day, and Route 220 serves about 52,000 vehicles each day. They said that by making these changes, crashes may be reduced by about 15-20 percent.
A project that has been proposed is Ogden Road to Starkey Road. This project would create a third lane in both directions, adding new sidewalks and pedestrian accommodations and modifying bike lanes. This project is estimated to start in 2027, and it’s estimated to cost about $19.9 million.