(The Center Square) – Renowned for no big rigs among 100-plus fuel pumps, its food, clean bathrooms and its creator’s name-inspired mascot, Buc-ee’s and a second location in North Carolina are fast approaching on the horizon.
An informational meeting for the neighborhood is Thursday in Rocky Mount, rezoning in the Gold Rock area off Interstate 95 is expected to be addressed in early November, and Rocky Mount Mayor Pro Tempore Jabaris Walker has confirmed company interest. Buc-ee’s first location in the state is still under construction in Alamance County at 1425 Trollingwood-Hawfields Road, just off Exit 152 of Interstates 40 and 85, with Department of Transportation changes to an interchange underway since June ahead of a late 2027 opening.
Buc-ee’s is providing $10 million of the $38.7 million road and bridge improvements for its Alamance location. In total, it’ll spend about $60 million to $70 million in private capital for construction. The estimated annual sales tax revenues are $1.8 million, plus more than $2 million in property taxes. No state, county or city grant incentive money is in the project.
Fourteen states are home to the nearly five dozen travel center destinations, with most (37) in Texas. They are as far west as Colorado and Arizona, no more north than Missouri, Ohio and Kentucky and will be in all Atlantic Seaboard states from Florida to Virginia once a location is open in North Carolina.
The site in Nash County would develop 34 acres and be centralized to the I-95 corridor running from Maine to Florida.
Buc-ee’s projects generate great discussion and significant support and criticism. Traffic, environment and shopping local are among the chief complaints; economic growth – even novelty tourism – without being just another warehouse kind of build is among the praises.
The name is a combination using co-founder Arch “Beaver” Alpin III’s childhood name and the nickname of his Labrador retriever Buck. It produces an inspiration from the 1950s cartoon mascot Bucky Beaver in Ipana toothpaste commercials.
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