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New Budget Puts Ferry Toll Decisions In Local Hands

NCDOT

Some eastern North Carolinians are pleased with an aspect of the new state budget proposal.  State legislators have left decisions on whether to charge tolls on some coastal ferry routes in the hands of local transportation planning boards.  

State Department of Transportation officials could only start the process to levy ferry ride charges if the planning boards sent in a written request.  Larry Summers is a town commissioner in Oriental.  Neuse and Pamlico ferries serve many who visit his town.

"We have no interstates in Pamlico County at all," Summers says.  "There is almost no reason for anyone to come down by highway if the ferry starts costing additional money.  That would really stop some people from taking a somewhat alternative way to come down into this part of eastern Carolina."

Officials in coastal communities believe putting ferry decisions in the hands of the communities that use them is a sound idea.  Atlantic Beach mayor Trace Cooper serves as chair of theDown East Rural Planning Organization.  He says his group and similar municipal planning organizations know more about ferries that state lawmakers do..

"It's also relatively new...the idea of giving these RPOs some authority," Cooper says.   "We're planning organizations that work with the DOT to prioritize transportation projects.  So this is a good thing for the RPOs and the MPOs to give them a little more decision-making power than we've had in the past.

North Carolina has a total of seven ferry routes.  The four that cross Hatteras Inlet, Currituck Sound and the Neuse and Pamlico rivers are free of charge.

Gurnal Scott joined North Carolina Public Radio in March 2012 after several stops in radio and television. After graduating from the College of Charleston in his South Carolina hometown, he began his career in radio there. He started as a sports reporter at News/Talk Radio WTMA and won five Sportscaster of the Year awards. In 1997, Gurnal moved on to television as general assignment reporter and weekend anchor for WCSC-TV in Charleston. He anchored the market's top-rated weekend newscasts until leaving Charleston for Memphis, TN in 2002. Gurnal worked at WPTY-TV for two years before returning to his roots in radio. He joined the staff of Memphis' NewsRadio 600 WREC in 2004 eventually rising to News Director. In 2006, Raleigh news radio station WPTF came calling and he became the station's chief correspondent. Gurnal’s reporting has been honored by the South Carolina Broadcasters Association, the North Carolina Associated Press, and the Radio Television Digital News Association of the Carolinas.
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