There are 4,500 miles of roadways in the N.C. Department of Transportation’s Division 2, and Neil Lassiter has looked down the center line of every one.
Retiring at the end of June, the division engineer, who is one month shy of working 30 years for DOT, has spent his entire adult life helping to keep wheels rolling over Eastern North Carolina’s roads, bridges and railways, or floating in between.
Lassiter, an N.C. State University engineering graduate from the tiny Northhampton County town of Woodland, reflected on his career Saturday as he rode along one of those roadways to the Outer Banks in Division 1, where he spent his first tour as a division engineer.
“There are more roads in Division 2 than there are in some states,” said Lassiter, who was tapped for the Division 2 post, which includes Lenoir, Greene, Jones, Craven, Pamlico, Pitt and Beaufort counties, after spending time in almost every phase of DOT work, including construction, traffic engineering and engineering management.
“I cut my teeth on the first pre-cast segmental bridge in North Carolina,” he said.
It was the N.C. 32 bridge over the Albemarle Sound that connected Chowan and Washington counties. He likened it to “a big tinker toy” project with construction components built elsewhere and set up at the site.
Lassiter was named in 1987 to the Division 1 top post and said, “That was pretty exciting because of all the natural events. I worked on N.C. 12 a lot and was no stranger to the bridges there because of all the hurricanes and floods.”
“The biggest event I’ve ever been involved with was Hurricane Floyd in ’99; that was a game changer. We’d never seen anything to the degree and magnitude of Floyd. We had a number of roads, bridges under water; had primary routes impassable; roadways washed out; had to review how we were analyzing structures.”
Bridges and roadways, even those along major highways such as U.S. 70, were under water, and Lassiter said that during that storm the Division 2 headquarters actually had to be moved in order to direct repairs and get service back to the people.
There are 7,000 bridges in North Carolina, he said, and Eastern North Carolina has its share, including one that he said became the most fun of his career — the Neuse River Bridge.
“I didn’t have day-to-day responsibility for that project, but in making sure such an important project to the region got built, I still consider it a signature project,” he said. “It gets called the ‘spaghetti bridge’ because of the geometric alignments, but what really made it special is how it was received by the New Bern community. It became a testament to the New Bern skyline.”
But it, like most of the bridge projects, literally and figuratively had highs and lows. A worker died building it, and Lassiter said, “I’ve lost four employees and had to meet with their families. And they were part of our family as well. I hold them up as part of the many dedicated DOT employees trying to do the best they can for North Carolina.”
He managed about 800 temporary and full-time personnel during the Division 2 employment peak. That number is now about 560 people, with construction slowed and reliance on private industry partners for some road construction.
“We’re trying to make the best of it, but some things we provide don’t lend themselves to production,” Lassiter said.
During his career, he has learned “to take a cradle-to-the-grave perspective on projects, get them properly planned, constructed and not forget the maintenance side. That’s one of DOT’s biggest assets. It’s not just the ribbon cutting.”
But Lassiter has attended hundreds of ribbon cuttings and thousands of public hearings and information meetings. His abilities to relate to the regular people attending those often-contentious hearings may be Lassiter’s biggest asset, said Bob Mattocks, a former longtime N.C. Board of Transportation member who served when Lassiter was named District 2 chief.
“He did not lose his temper in hearings and when people would lose their cool,” Mattocks said. “He was always so good about not getting upset. He is so extremely honest, fair to all his employees and a good PR person for DOT.”
Hugh Overholt, current N.C. Board of Transportation member for Division 2, said, “We can take pride in the state-of-the-art bridges, the bypasses and the projects on the table and ready, but most important of all has been Neil’s people skills and handling DOT employees who will all miss him.”
“Professionally and personally, I will miss him,” Overholt continued. “He has done a great job in a very difficult district where we are confronted with having to deal with all modes of transportation and the challenges in the permitting process because our wetlands are daunting.”
Overholt listed among Lassiter's successes seeing environmental permitting of the U.S. 70 bypass of Havelock as well as the Gallant's Channel Bridge between Morehead City and Beaufort for which the contract should be let in January; moving forward the U.S. 70 bypass of Kinston and completion of Harvey Parkway in Lenoir County; and the progress on projects southwest of Greenville that will be a huge asset to the medical university.
“In the last four years we have transitioned division engineering from strictly highway to ferry, port and some rail components and I have been involved in issues” with rural and municipal planning organizations, Lassister said.
Air travel has figured into his work as well, he said. “Look at the work at the GTP. In addition to the rail line service to that area, we designed one of the taxiways and aprons for the airport there. The world's largest aircraft landed in Kinston.”
Driving the highways he has helped to build, pave or maintain since 1984, Lassiter said, “At the end of the day, I look at my career not only on the technical side, but in the opportunities I’ve had for leadership. I learned a lot about people, human behavior, from internally trying to motivate in our operation and also in trying to understand the people on the outside whose lives were being affected by what we do.
“In doing it, I learned a lot about myself, why I’m here. Coming from a small town in Eastern North Carolina didn’t hurt. I know these people. I worked for them. I have to believe I was put here for a purpose, to serve the people of North Carolina as best I could.”
Sue Book can be reached at 252-635-5665 or sue.book@newbernsj.com. Follow her on Twitter at @SueJBook.