Chad Kimes has overseen major highway projects and smaller roadway improvements in Wilmington and its surrounding areas for the past 33 years. This month, the N.C. Department of Transportation Division 3 engineer is hanging up his hard hat and retiring.

While Kimes plans to spend more time with his family, he isn’t leaving the field entirely. He’s already contracted with an engineering firm to work as a consultant.

“My heart will always be with the Department of Transportation,” Kimes said. “That’s why I’m going into consulting. I still want to be part of the process and help out where I can.”

Perhaps it’s unsurprising that Kimes isn’t leaving transportation entirely, as the work is in his blood. His passion for the NCDOT and building roadways began as a child – he tagged along with his father, who also worked for the DOT, to projects under construction.

Kimes pursued his dream of working in the transportation industry by studying engineering at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, and he became an intern with the NCDOT while still a student. After becoming a full-time agency employee in 1994, he held numerous positions, including deputy engineer, project engineer, county maintenance engineer, resident engineer, division operation engineer and division construction engineer.

In 2019, Kimes became the NCDOT Division 3 Engineer.

Most recently, he oversaw Cape Fear Memorial Bridge repairs, a project for which he worked to obtain the necessary funding and help ensure crews finished the job early. In July, officials announced that a longtime effort to replace the bridge received a $242 million U.S. Department of Transportation grant. The Business Alliance for a Sound Economy named Kimes as one of the officials whohelped secure the funding.

Kimes took the lead on other projects, including the construction of Interstate 140 and the Hampstead and Jacksonville bypasses, College Road improvements, the Military Cutoff Road Extension and the widening of N.C. 211.

Kimes also had a role in the construction of the 65-foot-high Surf City Bridge, one of the first bridges in the area that included a dedicated multi-use path separated from vehicular traffic. When the Cape Fear Memorial Bridge is replaced, it, too, will have a multi-use path, Kimes said.

Kimes is responsible for numerous smaller projects. For example, he ranks getting the roads open for first responders after major storms among his most significant accomplishments.

“I think it’s been close to 20 main storms I’ve worked on,” Kimes said. “Working through all those hurricanes and making sure the roads get back open, that’s probably been one of the most satisfying parts of my job throughout my whole career.”

Nearly as satisfying to Kimes are the many projects he worked on that make the area amenable to foot and bike traffic, such as sidewalk and Safe Routes to School projects.

However, getting large and small transportation projects off the ground and completed isn’t without its challenges, the biggest of which is obtaining funding, Kimes said.

“We’re in a tourism hotspot here,” he said. “We’re trying to catch up with the population growth, so funding will always be the number one challenge. At some point, funding is going to have to be addressed at a much higher level. But right now, it is a challenge to keep up with need.”

In addition to obtaining money from NCDOT, he has applied for and received grants through a federal infrastructure bill passed in 2021, as well as other sources. When necessary, he also sought public and private partnerships.

Devising solutions to jammed traffic on the region’s older streets is another issue Kimes faced regularly. Because the area’s older roads weren’t designed to carry heavy traffic, adding new lanes often isn’t a possibility. Instead, according to Kimes, he and his team have consistently come up with innovative solutions to the problem, such as adding meridians on Market Street. Those meridians improve mobility and safety.

“We do studies on lots of road sections after they are completed and gather statistics,” Kimes said. “Where you have an intersection and do a U-turn, you reduce fatalities by 60%. Any time we save lives, that makes us sleep better at night.”

Before proceeding with transportation projects, Kimes consulted with various groups to learn how the proposed road construction would affect the wetlands, endangered species, Wilmington’s historic district and housing.

“This is probably one of the most important things we do,” Kimes said. “We go through the input with a fine-tooth comb and avoid those types of negative impacts. It’s a challenge to get to the final decision.”

Though Kimes is leaving the NCDOT, his legacy will live on. In addition to the many highway and road projects he has overseen, he and his team have numerous projects in the works, including the recently funded widening of College Road and interchange plans for key Wilmington roadways.

“There is a lot of work coming to the Wilmington region,” Kimes said.

Kimes has received a plethora of awards for his work with the NCDOT. However, the Long Leaf Pine Award he received in mid-August takes precedence.

“That award means so much to me,” Kimes said. “I’m a public servant. I am here to serve the people. I have so much love for the state transportation system and wish them the best.”