CaseStudy:Construction of a new interchange at McIntire Park

Consultation recently concluded on this high profile transportation project. On May 28, 2010, the ACHP executed a Memorandum of Agreement with the Federal Highway Administration, the City of Charlottesville, Virginia Department of Transportation, and the Virginia State Historic Preservation Officer for construction of a new grade-separated interchange at Route 250 Bypass and McIntire Road in Charlottesville. (This case was previously reported in Case Digest Fall 2009.)

Details
The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) received a congressional earmark in 2005 for construction of the Charlottesville interchange to improve traffic flow between the Route 250 Bypass, McIntire Road, and a proposed roadway through McIntire Park in northern Charlottesville. Since that time, a coalition of local preservationists have fought to stop construction of the roadway and the new interchange, arguing that the projects together will have too great an impact by taking acreage from McIntire Park, Charlottesville’s largest city park. Philanthropist Paul Goodloe McIntire gave the land to the City of Charlottesville in 1926. The park, including its 9-hole “Scottish-style” golf course, conforms to the natural topography of the site, with its hills and stream valley.

The City for 30 years has planned development of a roadway through town, and now considers the grade-separated interchange a critical aspect of the larger project. Parties opposed to the project, many of which were included as consulting parties in the Section 106 process, question FHWA’s decision to limit its environmental review to the interchange excluding the proposed new roadway, known as McIntire Road Extended (MRE). The MRE project is a state-funded new roadway that will pass through the National Register-eligible historic park. The City and the Virginia Department of Transportation must obtain Section 404 permits from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (Corps) for construction of both the MRE and the interchange. The Corps is the lead agency for compliance with Section 106 for the MRE. Consultation on that project is in progress and has been coordinated with FHWA. Both projects will affect McIntire Park and the Scottish-style golf course. Despite these concerns, the ACHP and Virginia State Historic Preservation Officer entered into the Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) because FHWA and the City agreed to mitigation measures that address indirect and cumulative effects of the project on McIntire Park.

The interchange alone will use approximately 5.8 acres of the National Register-eligible McIntire Park, most likely affecting the golf course, a historic bath house and pool, and the Dogwood Vietnam Memorial, all contributing features to the historic site. A second historic property to be affected is the Rock Hill Landscape—a Colonial Revival-design landscape constructed in the 1930s.

Consultation on the interchange resulted in an MOA which includes a series of measures intended to minimize and mitigate effects to McIntire Park and the Rock Hill Landscape. In addition to design changes to minimize the size and footprint of the interchange, the City is committed to documentation of the Rock Hill Landscape and significant features of the park; development of interpretive signs at both sites; and, landscape plans for both historic properties. To compensate for the loss of a portion of McIntire Park, the MOA also commits Charlottesville to acquire an easement or property right for public use of the Rock Hill Landscape, if possible.