The controversial and long-stalled Mid-Currituck Bridge project has received two key state permits, reviving concerns about the potential for severe environmental threats to some of North Carolina's most sensitive and iconic natural areas.
The proposed billion-dollar toll bridge over the northern Outer Banks has been delayed for decades over financial and environmental concerns. It would cross the pristine Currituck Sound about 30 miles south of the Virginia border, in a region that's home to important wildlife refuges, game lands, waterfowl habitat, fisheries, and other protected natural areas.
Construction and operation of the bridge would cause permanent damage to water quality for wildlife, wetlands, forests and residents who depend on well water. It opens the door to rapid overdevelopment in pristine coastal habitats that are unique and irreplaceable, and which are subject to severe weather that has repeatedly damaged the built environment.
It would also be a pointless waste of state transportation dollars on a toll bridge that would see appreciable traffic for only a few months of each year, when such funds are much more critically needed in other parts of the state. In fact, no state funding has yet been allocated for the project.
Statement by Erin Carey, Deputy Director, Sierra Club North Carolina Chapter:
"It's baffling to think that the state would waste resources on a massive bridge to the Outer Banks when its existence would cause irreversible damage to the very things that make our barrier islands beautiful and unique. People love the Outer Banks for the wildlife, world-class fishing, and remote, natural beauty. This project would devastate all of those things."
"It's irresponsible to issue water quality permits for the Mid-Currituck Bridge when it stands to create lasting, significant harm to residents' drinking water and surrounding aquatic habitat, not just during construction, but permanently."
"It won't help with hurricane evacuation, and in fact wll burden year-round residents with onerous tolls while diverting state funding from transportation repairs and infrastructure elsewhere in the state that serve far more travelers."
Statement by Julie Furr Youngman, Senior Attorney, Southern Environmental Law Center:
“We are disappointed that the state agencies charged with protecting North Carolina’s water and coastal resources would give the green light to an economically wasteful and environmentally damaging bridge through the pristine Currituck Sound, especially when improving existing land routes would cause far less environmental damage, do a better job at meeting the project’s purposes of alleviating traffic congestion and providing reliable evacuation routes, and spare limited transportation funds for areas of the Outer Banks with more pressing infrastructure needs.”