With the start of spring comes the start of road construction season - what projects are coming and where?
PITTSBURGH (KDKA) - Hello March and hello the start of construction season!
Over the next two months, major work on our roads will get underway, and up first is one of the big four of the season - more work on I-79, and in fact...it starts tonight.
This is the stretch from the Neville Island Bridge to the Crafton exit.
It seems like just yesterday they lifted all restrictions on this stretch but here they come again. Beginning at 7 p.m. tonight, there will be a lane restriction.
"[We'll] take traffic down to a single lane, just restriping the lanes and by the time we're done there this weekend left to southbound lanes and that direction just shifted over to the right," said Doug Thompson from PennDOT District 11.
That initial work should wrap by midday on Saturday but then it will pick up again in the overnight hours during the week with more lane restrictions.
"We'll be installing a temporary barrier in that southbound corridor there as well," Thompson said.
Then in the summer, there will be even more. It will take a couple weeks of to prepare for the coming work on a long traffic pattern.
"We're still going to be maintaining two lanes in the southbound direction plus two lanes and in the northbound direction that must be split though," Thompson explained.
One northbound express lane will be on the southbound side with the other northbound lane remaining on the northbound side and able to exit at the Coraolis exit.
However, be cautioned about these construction lanes.
"The lane widths themselves are only narrow down a foot but the shoulders are a lot narrower so you feel more confined," Thompson said.
So, the preparation work starts tonight and during the overnight hours for the next two weeks with the crossover going into effect the weekend of March 16 and continuing until November.
While it's one of those projects that seems like it's been going on forever - the north of Neville Island has been ongoing for a couple of years and they have some finishing work this year. A section from the bridge to Crafton is going into year two and they'll have some work here next year.
This year, there's another project starting in April from Crafton to Parkway West, the condition of the road demands work and now they've got the funding.