·         In addition to Abernathy Road being outside the limits of this project and as stated above, it is GDOT’s general practice not to consider general purpose interchanges for arterial access ramps to express lanes. General purpose and express lane interchanges remain as separate facilities to avoid potential operational impacts of combining both traffic types into a single location. We are forwarding this comment to the I-285 Top End Express Lanes project team, which is evaluating possible access points between I-285 and SR 400 south of the North Springs MARTA Station.

·         As currently proposed, motorists in north Sandy Springs may enter and exit the express lanes system within one mile north or south of the Northridge Road where there is a direct merge/slip ramp access between the general purpose lanes and express lanes. These express lanes access points would allow the drivers to enter the system and to transfer from Sandy Springs into the express lanes network along I-285 as well as the collector-distributor (CD) lane system being constructed under the Transform 285/400 Interchange project that is currently under construction.

·         Spalding Drive was considered as an access point in early planning studies. Through further evaluation, the North Springs MARTA Station was selected as the access point for this area. An express lanes access point is not proposed at Spalding Drive; however, there is a proposed direct merge/slip ramp access point, near Spalding Drive.