Mega travel centers planned for I-77 and Bluff Road

The intersection of Bluff Road and Interstate 77 is about to go truckin’ in a big way.

National truck stop giants Love’s Travel Stop and TravelCenters of America/Petro are building competing centers on the north side of I-77. They include restaurants, travel stores, mechanical shops and acres of truck parking.

But some neighbors and others are concerned about the impact on traffic in the area and nearby wetlands.

“There were concerns and still are,” Todd Beasley, a middle school science teacher at nearby Heathwood Hall Episcopal School, said in an email to The State.

The centers are 1.5 miles from the Congaree River near low-lying land once known as the Green Diamond property. Beasley said the concerns ranged from habitat destruction, increased traffic, increased flow of chemicals from impervious surfaces into surrounding wetlands and a loss of biodiversity and green space.

“Are the concerns resolved? We do not know as we do not know what the end product will look like and if it functions as designed,” wrote Beasley, who urged his students to write to the city of Cayce to express those concerns when the Love’s project was unveiled more than a year ago.

The TravelCenters of America/Petro center is being built on about 25 acres on the east side of Bluff Road across from the present Burger King and Shell station. About 20 acres of land are being cleared on the west side on the stretch of South Beltline Boulevard that leads to Heathwood Hall, commonly known as Heathwood Road.

TravelCenters of America/Petro will be part of the city of Columbia. Love’s is in the city of Cayce, which annexed the 3,000-acre Green Diamond property about a decade ago during efforts to build a huge “city within a city” development there.

“I would have the same concerns as any private citizens about the loss of a huge stand of pine trees … and the (impact) on wetlands,” said Heathwood Hall headmaster Chris Hinchey.

Hinchey said the main concerns were with the Love’s center, which is presently clearing a large stand of pine trees and abuts a large expanse of wetlands. Hinchey noted that the school is 1.5 miles from the development and he assumed that state environmental officials would assure compliance with laws to protect the environment.

“They have been reasonably responsive,” Hinchey said of Love’s officials. “We’re looking to be good neighbors and hope they’ll be good neighbors for us.”

A spokesman for Ohio-based TravelAmerica said its center would be completed by January 2017, but declined further comment.

Other TravelAmerica/Petro centers host a variety amenities and stores, including restaurants, convenience stores and professional truck driver supply stores.

Kealey Dorian, spokeswoman for the Oklahoma-based Love’s, said its center would have a convenience store, professional truckers store, seven showers, a mechanical shop, two restaurants — a McDonald’s and a Chester’s Chicken — and space for 107 tractor-trailer trucks to park for the night.

It should be open by the end of the year, she said.

As for the concerns about the environment and traffic, she said that a vice president of the company had met with school officials at the beginning of the project. “It ended very amicably.”

This story was originally published April 25, 2016 at 5:52 PM with the headline "Mega travel centers planned for I-77 and Bluff Road."