Two big highway projects in the Triangle will take longer than expected to finish. Why?
By now, many drivers have gotten used to the construction zones on Interstates 40 and 440 around Raleigh, which is good because the work is going to take longer than expected.
The overhaul of a four-mile section of the I-440/Raleigh Beltline was scheduled to take four years and be finished in June 2023. Now it’s not expected to be completed until October 2024.
Meanwhile, the widening of an 11-mile stretch of I-40 between Raleigh and the Cleveland community in Johnston County will take two years longer than expected to complete. Work began in late 2018 and is now not scheduled to be finished until August 2024.
Several factors have contributed to the delays, according to the N.C. Department of Transportation and the contractors doing the work.
In some places, it has taken longer than expected to acquire right-of-way and move gas, power and other utility lines, said NCDOT spokesman Marty Homan. On top of that, contractors are having trouble finding enough workers and getting materials on time because of global supply chain issues, Homan said.
Those problems are worse in the Triangle where three big highway projects are taking place at once: the widening of I-40 and I-440 and the construction of an 18-mile stretch of the Triangle Expressway across southern Wake County.
“Having those big projects is sort of squeezing the workforce,” Homan said. “And it’s stressing our utility partners, too. They’re dealing with the same sort of shortages that we are.”
Part of the I-40 widening project should be completed next year, Homan said. The contractor, S.T. Wooten Corp., expects to finish adding two lanes to each side of I-40 from the Raleigh Beltline to where U.S. 70 splits off at Exit 309 by sometime next year.
But the section from there down to the N.C. 42 interchange will take another year or so to finish. The work at the interchange is complex, with N.C. 42 being converted into a diverging diamond pattern and new exit and entrance ramps being added at nearby Cleveland Road.
Another complex project that’s taking longer than expected is the construction of an underpass to carry Blue Ridge Road under Hillsborough Street and the N.C. Railroad tracks near the N.C. State Fairgrounds.
NCDOT awarded Lane Construction Corp. a single contract to build the underpass and widen the Beltline at the same time because of their proximity. Work on the underpass was scheduled to begin in 2020, then delayed until just after the State Fair in 2021.
Because the underpass is expected to take 22 months to build, NCDOT wants to time the work to begin just after the State Fair so traffic is affected during only one fair and not two.
The project entails building temporary railroad tracks that freight and passenger trains can use while a permanent bridge over Blue Ridge is constructed. Lane and NCDOT had not worked everything out with the N.C. Railroad and the utility companies to allow construction to get started when the fair closed last fall, Homan said.
“There were just too many outstanding issues to be able to stay on that schedule,” he said.
Now the Blue Ridge underpass work is scheduled to begin when the 2022 State Fair closes this fall and be finished in time for the 2024 fair. That schedule, of course, is subject to change.
This story was originally published March 25, 2022 at 12:28 PM.
