House causes headaches, honks, humor

TOPSAIL ISLAND, NC (WWAY) — A small house in Surf City is getting a big following on Topsail Island.

From Brunswick County to Pender County, orange cones and bridges cause traffic every day, but in Surf City, a house is not something you would expect to see causing a gridlock.

“They had the traffic blocked off of Roland,” resident Gretchen O’quin said.

O’quin said she was standing at the pier when she saw it.

“My friend George from On Shore Surf Shop came up and I asked him, ‘What’s with the cop?’ O’quin said. “He said, ‘They are moving a house.” I said, ‘Yeah right,’ and sure enough he was right.”

Then she snapped a picture.

“The funniest thing about it was that there were people honking and that sure wasn’t going to make the house move any faster,” O’quin said.

She said drivers out here know all too well about being late to work.

“With the swing bridge, sometimes it does close, so that’s a common thing for us locals, but being stuck behind a moving house is something that might raise a few eyebrows with their supervisor,” O’quin said.

That is why O’quin posted her picture to the Topsail Area Alerts Facebook page.

“A lot of us have children and jobs and it comes up immediately, so people know what’s going on,” O’quin said.

Others followed her by posting updates tracking the house.

“The story is that the property was purchased over at the south end and they moved it over the high bridge, ’cause they want to build a bigger house.”

Surf City Town Manager Larry Bergman said occasionally, homeowners get permits to move a smaller, older structure off their lot. North topsail town leaders said the house stopped traffic on the high rise bridge this afternoon, but it is now in Sneads Ferry.

As this rare traffic whoa headed off the island, O’quin said drivers needs to prepare for another, more normal one.

“It’s coming up on a holiday weekend, so you’ve got to pack your patience,” O’quin said. “That’s the way it is.”