The primary purpose of the SHC initiative is to provide a safe, reliable, and high-speed network of highways that connect to travel destinations throughout and just outside North Carolina. There are several goals associated with the initiative, which incorporate the three themes mentioned above. The foremost goal is the recognition of new long-term, ultimate facility type designations for each highway corridor. This facility type, or vision for how travel along a facility should operate, is a recommendation to move planning beyond jurisdictional boundaries, improve decision-making between NCDOT and its stakeholders, and genuinely build a consensus-based dialogue with citizens who live along these corridors. The envisioned facility type provides motorists a high-speed, safe, and efficient facility for travel.

A related goal is to use the initiative as a tool to influence and affect ongoing planning and project related decisions in order to realize the facility type vision. Influence can extend to making project and/or design changes or possible reconsideration of project scope. One example of a small-scale project change would be the early acquisition of right-of-way needed to support larger-scale interchanges for a freeway, even if an expressway facility was the project under construction. In other cases, through the preparation of corridor studies, the SHC initiative can act as additional input in the development of a planning document to support a particular alternative. Major corridor level studies will provide technical data, environmental information, and local input that should lead to an improved and potentially streamlined, decision-making process. It should be noted however that the SHC initiative, the facility types, and any future studies, which support these facility types, do not supercede or negate current federal and state planning requirements. Implementing conclusions or suggested improvements from corridor studies must still follow the laws of the NEPA process.

The SHC initiative is expected to influence the decisions described below:

• Funding Decisions. Providing a consistent high-level of mobility along corridors requires additional capital costs for the additional infrastructure (e.g., additional right-of-way and bridges). Additional funds and/or establishing new funding sources will be needed to develop master plans for these corridors and to finance improvements necessary to achieve the high-level of mobility.
• Project Planning Decisions. During project development process, decisions need to be made that examine how individual project improvements fit within a larger corridor, particularly in regards to the function and connectivity of the entire facility. Establishing the role of corridor will provide a stronger purpose and need for projects along the facility.
• Design Decisions. Appropriate design elements will be needed to provide a high-speed roadway, consistent with envisioned facility type, while also preserving the natural and human environment.
• Operation Decisions. Managing access to corridors is crucial to achieving and maintaining a high-level of mobility and the envisioned facility type; therefore it requires consistent and careful decisions on driveway connections and traffic signal installations.
• Local Land Use Decisions. Achieving and maintaining the desired facility type requires consistent, compatible, and coordinated land use decisions through partnering with local governments.