FLORENCE - News that Home Depot will build a new home improvement store on Radio Drive in Florence has generated concerns about heavy traffic on the two-laned road.

Site plans have been submitted to the Florence County/Municipal Planning Department for a $4.4 million Home Depot building on land adjacent to the General Electric Medical Systems plant. In addition, plans for a $1.2 million LongHorn Steakhouse restaurant have been submitted. Olive Garden and Chili's restaurants submitted preliminary plans for buildings on the property this week.

The development, owned by Pennsylvania Real Estate Investment Trust, which owns the Magnolia Mall and Commons at Magnolia, will be called Plaza at Magnolia.

Traffic on Radio Drive has increased during the years as development continues in the area. With Florence Civic Center, several new hotels, a multi-screen movie theater, three shopping centers and several restaurants in the area, traffic often comes to a standstill at the intersection of Radio Drive and David McLeod Boulevard. But the city and the South Carolina Department of Transportation have been working on plans to ease the congestion in the area.

Drew Griffin, director of public works for the city of Florence, said plans are to widen Radio Drive to three lanes, with a center turn lane, and turn lanes into the PREIT property.

"The plans involve realignment of entrances into the PREIT property at Woody Jones Boulevard," Griffin said. "It will include egresses and ingresses into the property."

Griffin said a traffic study performed by Day-Wilburn and Associates, an Atlanta transportation consulting firm, showed an average 24-hour traffic count of more than 7,000 cars on the section of Radio Drive between David McLeod Boulevard and Woody Jones Boulevard. But projections of traffic on the road in 2014 jump to more than 20,700 cars a day.

Florence City Manager David Williams said the traffic study was commissioned long before PREIT bought the property from GE because of extensive development in the area.

"We commissioned this traffic study knowing that the whole area is going to be seeing a lot more growth, in addition to the growth we've already seen," Williams said. "The traffic is going to be amazing out there, and we're trying to get ahead of it."

Williams said the improvements planned for the area have been in the works for some time.

"There are things that can be done, we're going to have a center turn lane, and some stop lights, plus some right turn lanes there so that traffic doesn't just stop there," Williams said.

Improvements have already been made at the intersection of Ebenezer Road and Radio Drive, with traffic signals added, which are expected to go into operation soon.

The traffic at that intersection is even heavier than the traffic near David McLeod Boulevard, and is expected to get heavier in the future.

According to Day-Wilburn's projections, by 2014, more than 27,000 cars a day are expected to travel on the stretch of Radio Drive between Woody Jones Blvd. and Ebenezer Road.

Griffin said because construction is expected to begin soon on the Home Depot site, he thinks work on the improvements to Radio Drive will be starting soon.

"I think it's going to be very quick," Griffin said. "I see this happening this year."

But making improvements along Radio Drive isn't the only thing that needs to be done to ease congestion.

The intersection of Dunbarton Drive at David McLeod Boulevard is a major concern. The intersection is a confusing mess at peak traffic times. Griffin said plans are being made for improvements at the interchange, but the city's involvement is limited.

"The interchange at Dunbarton has to be resolved, and that's between the property owners and SCDOT," Griffin said.

Possibilities for the intersection at Dunbarton Drive and David McLeod Boulevard include re-routing Dunbarton so that it intersects with Radio Drive, which runs south of its present location. But no decisions have been made by SCDOT.

"We've been in touch with Home Depot about what needs to be done there, but we don't have a project to do anything right now," said Michael Bethea of SCDOT's Florence office.

Bethea said developers of the property will be responsible for improvements to roads in the area, and the development cannot go forward until SCDOT approves its plans.

"The frontage road, Dunbarton is a problem where it meets the intersection of Radio and David McLeod, it will have to be addressed," Bethea said. "We're going to have to make sure that traffic operates efficiently and safely."

But concerns over traffic safety from citizens could put a crimp in the development. Citizens for Responsible Economic Development (RED) have already complained that Florence County Council acted improperly when it rezoned the property to at B-3 designation in March 2004.

The group said the council did not follow proper notification procedures when it met to consider the zoning request, and that the special meeting called by the council to rezone the property was "designed to keep the public off balance."

Three years ago RED launched a legal battle that has delayed the construction of a proposed Wal-Mart SuperCenter on Beltline Drive across from West Florence High School. The group, however, is not planning to take Home Depot to court said Carolyn Jebaily, RED's chairwoman.

"We don't have the resources to take legal actions," Jebaily said. "It's a shame that citizens have to do that, its comprehensive planning that is supposed to do that."

Jebaily said the group's big-gest concern is that the developer of the project be required to pay for road and drainage improvements.

"It's not a bad location in terms of the current traffic conditions, but our main concern is to make sure the tax payer isn't the one who's going to pay for the infrastructure improvements," Jebaily said.

"Though infrastructure is supposed to dictate zoning, it's the other way around in Florence. Zoning dictates infrastructure."