NCDOT opens new I-26 lanes in Buncombe County, with $531 million project underway. Unveiling new interchanges, overpasses in progress, differing opinions on design, cost considerations, and completion dates. Concerns raised over the impact on community, urging for continued improvements.
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NCDOT opens new I-26 lanes in Buncombe County amid $531 million widening project.
NCDOT opens new I-26 lanes in Buncombe County amid $531 million widening project.
Just a few days after new permanent lanes opened along Interstate 26 the south side of Asheville, N.C., additional lanes became operational the morning of April 15, 2025, the state Department of Transportation (NCDOT) announced.
After an overnight closure to remove traffic control devices, the NCDOT contractor opened traffic to three lanes from Long Shoals Road southeast to Glenn Bridge Road in South Asheville. From there, the roadway opened to another four lanes of travel and connected with more lanes beyond Airport Road, the news release said.
Fluor-United Joint Venture is the contractor for the Asheville-Buncombe County section of the I-26 project. NCDOT estimated the project to cost $531 million — $271 million for the Henderson County portion and $263 million for the Buncombe County portion.
"This has been a long time coming and we're certainly happy to open this stretch of interstate for local drivers and those passing through," Luke Middleton, NCDOT resident engineer, said in the agency's announcement. "We certainly hope drivers remain safe while driving this stretch and obey the posted signs and speed limits."
Among the final tasks that road crews needed to complete included the installation of snow-plowable reflectors, fresh lane markings and roadside signs some of which was finished during overnight closures.
Opening this south Asheville stretch allows crews to concentrate on the northern half of I-26 widening in Buncombe County, from Long Shores Road to Brevard Road.
The northern stretch includes the creation of a new interchange at Exit 35, the Asheville Citizen-Times reported. Those plans were added after the project started. Building the new exit provides drivers with another route to Brevard Road by the North Carolina Arboretum.
The Exit 35 interchange has an estimated late-2026 completion date, according to NCDOT.
Crews still must complete new westbound lanes in the northern portion of the project, finalize the new Blue Ridge Parkway bridge and remove the old structure. Agency officials anticipate completing those tasks by late 2026.
"Drivers should certainly notice a big difference with the new lanes," Middleton said. "And they should also see that we're continuing to work and build a newer and better interstate."
I-26 Connector Designs Again Include Bridge Over Patton Avenue
Plans unveiled earlier in the year for the monumental I-26 connector project in Asheville have revived a contentious element thought to have been nixed 15 years before, according to advocates: an interstate bridge that would take the freeway over Patton Avenue on the west side of the French Broad River, rather than under.
Joe Minicozzi, an urban planner and a founding member of the Asheville Design Center (ADC), said he "blew a gasket" when he saw new plans for the project, which featured a design he believed was killed in 2010.
It was not mentioned, specifically, during a February 2025 update on the project from NCDOT to the Asheville City Council, but a slide presentation from Nathan Moneyham, a construction engineer for the state agency's Division 13 office, showed an eight-lane overpass across Patton Avenue as it approaches the Bowen Bridge, which would intersect the street between the Sam's Club and Westgate shopping centers, according to Asheville Watchdog.
Minicozzi and others have spent decades advocating for changes to the I-26 Connector — among them, pushing for Patton Avenue to be rebuilt as a boulevard on both sides of the river to make it less of a suburban highway design, and more akin to the downtown core.
In its entirety, the $1.3 billion NCDOT project will design a median-divided freeway accessible only by interchanges, which will connect I-26 in southwest Asheville to U.S. Highways 19/23/70 throughout the northwest part of the city.
The overpass is part of the project's north section, which runs from Haywood Road in West Asheville and crosses the French Broad to connect to the three federal highways by Broadway Street. At $1 billion, the design-build contract for this section is the largest ever awarded by NCDOT.
In May 2024, Archer-Wright Joint Venture won the contract, which underwent a six-month "optimization and refinement process" after all contract costs for the northern section came in over budget, the Citizen-Times noted. The process shaved about $124 million off the initial cost estimate for the project.
But Moneyham told the newspaper in February 2025 via email that the design change of I-26 over Patton Avenue was submitted as an "alternative technical concept" by Archer-Wright before the optimization and refinement process. NCDOT reviewed and approved it in July 2023.
While the preference for Patton Avenue over I-26 was accounted for, ultimately the cost and schedule savings of the change were significant enough to win the project, Moneyham said.
"This cost difference can be attributed to the reduced utility conflicts, reduction of temporary work and reduced associated schedule risks with the I-26 over Patton [Avenue] design," he said. "These conflicts are not new but the significant cost to relocate utilities and phase construction were significantly more than previously estimated."
Without the cost savings from Archer-Wright's initial bid, and the further savings realized in the optimization and refinement process, Moneyham explained that the department would not have been able to move forward and the project would have been delayed indefinitely.
ADC was founded in 2006 by designers, architects and engineers determined to produce alternative, more community-oriented solutions for the I-26 Connector.
In 2010, the nonprofit announced that the previous over-Patton Avenue design would no longer be considered an alternative by NCDOT. It would be less expensive by about $13 million to have I-26 go under Patton, according to another report from that same year.
Now, though, it is said to be the more expensive option.
"The money is going to speak there," said Bruce Emory, a retired civil engineer, transportation planner, and ADC member.
While there have been positive changes, and the east side of the river, closer to downtown, is hopefully poised to become a more urban and pedestrian-oriented street, he was also concerned about a change that eliminated a ramp from I-240 to Patton Avenue, making it more difficult to get to or from parts of downtown and the South Slope.
Chris Joyell, a former ADC executive director, said he is optimistic about changes for Patton Avenue east of the river — like those that would scale back impacts to Hill Street and Hillcrest apartments, and plans to reduce the speed limit on Patton to 25 mph as it enters downtown Asheville — but the I-26 overpass on the west side troubles him.
ADC "fought long and hard" to bring the highway under Patton Avenue, not only to protect the viewshed from West Asheville to downtown, but to prevent cyclists and pedestrians from being forced to cross under hundreds of ft. of concrete to traverse the corridor.
"I don't give up hope that this project can still get better. And I still think that the design-build process allows for that to happen. So, my message to [NCDOT] is, ‘Don't stop now,'" Joyell said. "Don't treat the west side of the river as the sacrifice zone for this project."
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