Head east on Chatham Street from downtown Cary and you reach the tracks at N.E. Maynard Road. Next to that crossing is a strip of international grocers and restaurants, some of which have been there for decades. Toyo Shokuhin & Gifts sells Japanese groceries, and its sake shop and tasting bar opened next door last fall. The Sea Depot is a few doors down. Mithai Indian Cafe, Patel Brothers and Awaze are all within a short walk.

This month the N.C. Department of Transportation put its plan for that crossing back in front of the public. The plan takes Maynard Road under the railroad and moves the Maynard and Chatham intersection off its current alignment. Construction is years off. The decisions about whose property gets bought, which driveways move and how traffic detours around the closure are being shaped now, and the public comment window closes Oct. 27.

What NCDOT has proposed

The project is officially called P-5718, the N.E. Maynard Road Grade Separation. It would carry Maynard Road beneath three rail lines at once: the North Carolina Railroad, Norfolk Southern's H-line and CSX's S-line. Those lines carry both freight and passenger trains through Cary. It falls under NCDOT's Sealed Corridor Program, which works to close or improve crossings along the Raleigh-to-Charlotte rail corridor.

NCDOT picked Design Concept 1. It lowers Maynard under the tracks and moves the Chatham Street intersection south of where it sits today, outside the railroad corridor. Design Concept 2 would have carried Maynard over Chatham and the tracks on a new alignment to the east. In public input, 63 people backed Concept 1 and four backed Concept 2. NCDOT also says Concept 1 means fewer relocations overall.

The finished roads, as drawn on the project page:

Both roads would have curb and gutter along the outside lanes. For anyone who walks or bikes from the nearby neighborhoods to the Chatham Street shops, the biggest change is sidewalk and bike-lane continuity through an intersection that currently runs straight across the tracks.

NCDOT's current estimate is $83.8 million: $37.3 million for property and $46.5 million for construction and utilities. Property is close to 45% of the budget. That share tells you how much of this project is about buying land around the intersection, and it explains why the businesses nearby are paying such close attention.

Why a crossing that has worked for decades is getting rebuilt

Right now cars and trains meet at the same level near Maynard and Chatham. WRAL reported that the crossing has had multiple pedestrian crashes over the past ten years. In May 2026, an Amtrak train hit a construction trailer that had come loose from a truck on the tracks. Six passengers were treated for minor injuries, and Maynard Road was closed for more than seven hours.

The project isn't new. NCDOT held a public meeting on it in October 2018. Earlier that month, project staff went door to door in Mobile Estates and Chatham Estates and met with 13 local business owners. In 2019, NCDOT presented the project at meetings hosted by the N.C. Latino Congress, and about 120 people attended the June session. Funding problems put the project on hold in May 2020. It restarted in June 2023 and is now funded for right-of-way and construction.

That gap matters. Much of what people remember about this project comes from 2018 drawings, and those drawings are now out of date.

The strip beside the tracks

The News & Observer once called the cluster of small shopping centers around East Chatham and Maynard Cary's "Little U.N." and a worthy destination for adventurous eaters. That was 2016. Korean Garden, which was in that roundup, is now listed as permanently closed, and several other businesses from it can't be confirmed as still open. These are the anchors that can be confirmed today:

• Toyo Shokuhin & Gifts, 748 E. Chatham St. The Japanese grocery's own site says it has served Cary and the surrounding area for 30 years, and the sake shop's site says more than 35.
• Toyo Sake Shop & Tasting Bar, also at 748 E. Chatham. It's a bottle shop and tasting bar from the same owners as the grocery, and it opened in fall 2025. WALTER named it a "New Fave" in its January 2026 issue.
• The Sea Depot, 750 E. Chatham St., Suite G, in Chatham Square. WRAL describes it as a family business that has been on East Chatham for nearly 20 years.
• Mithai Indian Cafe, 744 E. Chatham St. Cary Magazine lists it for dine-in, pickup, delivery and catering. Its founder started the shop in 2004.
• Patel Brothers, 802 E. Chatham St., open daily.
• Awaze, 904 N.E. Maynard Rd., the Ethiopian restaurant Azeb Mekonnen opened in 2015.

Toyo's newest addition opened in fall 2025, about two years after the underpass project restarted. The strip was still adding businesses while the plan to rebuild the intersection beside it sat on NCDOT's books. Nobody can yet say which of these businesses the project will affect, and NCDOT says it's too early to publish that list.

Why the old business count no longer holds

For years, the number attached to this project was about 12 affected businesses. According to WRAL's Oct. 7 report, NCDOT says that figure was a 2018 estimate based on the conceptual designs of the time. The agency now says the impact could be larger, for two reasons: more businesses operate in the area today, and the design is more detailed than it was in 2018.

That makes the 12-business figure a 2018 snapshot rather than a current count. Neither NCDOT nor WRAL has put a new number on it.

Business owners from the strip were at NCDOT's Oct. 6 meeting at First United Methodist Church on South Academy Street, reviewing the preliminary plans with the project team. WRAL's coverage reported that they are still working out what the project would mean for them.

NCDOT says it will keep looking for ways to reduce right-of-way impacts and business relocations as the design moves forward. Eligible businesses that do have to move may qualify for the state's relocation assistance program, depending on the circumstances.

The three questions NCDOT is asking now

The project page asks the public three specific questions, and each one deals with the part of the project that touches daily trips to this strip:

1. The temporary closure. NCDOT wants comments on closing the segment of N.E. Maynard Road that currently crosses the railroad.
2. Chatham Street and driveways. It asks about the realignment of E. Chatham Street and the reconfiguration of driveway access along both Maynard and Chatham. The page doesn't list which driveways would change.
3. The detour. NCDOT has posted a proposed detour map and wants comments on the route. It hasn't published the route in writing, so the map is the only place to see it.

For a strip of shopping centers, the driveway question probably matters most. If you can't easily turn into a plaza, it loses customers, even if none of its property is taken. NCDOT says every comment counts equally, whether it arrives through the project page, by email or by phone. It normally takes several weeks to compile comments after a public meeting.

Ways to comment before Oct. 27:

• The NCDOT PublicInput project page, which also has the maps and renderings
• Email to [email protected]
• Phone at 984-205-6615, using project code 7714

How long the in-between years could last

Sources don't agree on when construction starts. NCDOT's October release didn't give a construction date. WRAL reported property acquisition in summer 2027 and construction in summer 2030, and said both dates could change. The project's own PublicInput page also lists right-of-way in summer 2027, but shows construction beginning in spring 2032, based on the currently adopted State Transportation Improvement Program.

Both sources agree on summer 2027 for property acquisition, about nine months from now. After that, the gap before construction runs roughly three years on WRAL's schedule and close to five on the project page's. During that stretch, the road and the crossing would look the same, while property along the corridor changes hands.

For anyone who already shops this stretch of East Chatham, the right-of-way lines, driveway layouts and detour route get settled well before construction starts, and the comment period that ends Oct. 27 is when the public can weigh in on them.

If you own property near the Maynard and Chatham corridor and want to understand how right-of-way timelines like these can affect a sale, a purchase or your plans in the meantime, Alli Pepperling will walk you through what's public, what's still open and how it bears on your situation. Start with a free home valuation.