ROCKY MOUNT – A pair of roundabouts will be constructed on Goldrock Road (N.C. 48), starting next week.
Under a $380,000 contract awarded last fall by the N.C. Department of Transportation, Raleigh-based Fred Smith Co. will reconstruct two intersections with Goldrock Road. Below are the scheduled times when these two intersections will be closed to traffic for the construction of the roundabouts:
These construction times are subject to change. NCDOT will post any updates as needed to DriveNC.gov; people can search under "Nash County".
The city of Rocky Mount and NCDOT engineers did a joint review of these intersections after several severe crashes, and they determined these roundabouts were warranted to improve safety. The single-lane roundabouts that will be constructed will be smaller than a typical roundabout, requiring a smaller footprint to reduce impacts to any residential property.
These smaller designs, which NCDOT describes as mini-roundabouts, have shown to reduce injury and fatal crashes by 59%, according to a 2021 study by UNC-Charlotte conducted for NCDOT.
This NCDOT website demonstrates the ease of navigating roundabouts.