CDOT to close stretch of recently completed Northern Colorado express lanes until 2028
A portion of recently opened express lanes in Northern Colorado will be closed until 2028. The Colorado Department of Transportation says the closure is necessary in order to safely continue their construction project linking Northern Colorado and the Denver metro area.
Starting Friday night, CDOT will close the southbound express lane from CO 60 to CO 56 near Berthoud. That stretch was opened earlier this year to commuters after years of construction.
Though more than 18 miles of express lanes in both directions will remain open between Johnstown and Fort Collins, around two miles will be closed until the project is completed around 2028.
"(The express lanes) are pretty convenient," said Renee Cobb, a Pierce resident who uses the roadways for work. "I go straight from Denver to Fort Collins and it is pretty easy to get on and off that way."
Cobb said she wasn't aware of CDOT's plans to close a portion of the southbound express lane later this week. She said that left her wondering why the lane was ever opened that far south if CDOT knew they would need to make this decision.
"What was the point?" Cobb said.
"This has been a major safety issue for us," said Jared Fiel, spokesperson for CDOT.
Fiel said having construction crews sandwiched between northbound and southbound traffic has posed safety risks for both the workers and commuters. He noted there is a bottleneck that has been created after the interstate drops from three lanes to two lanes in each direction along the stretch.
"We are kind of in an hourglass. We have three lanes above us and three lanes below us," Fiel said.
Cobb said she has noticed that the construction zones and express lanes can sometimes come with safety concerns.
"People swerve in and out of the lanes that are not supposed to be, where the white lines are. It makes it really dangerous," Cobb said.
CDOT expects their express lane construction between the Denver metro area and Berthoud to take until the summer of 2028 to complete.
"We have to tie in the two sections together. The only way to do that is to close the one section of the express lane," Fiel said. "This is an area where we are really going to need people to be paying attention. Once this is all done it is smooth sailing up and down. That is what we are going to see when we get this complete."
Fiel said CDOT attempted to secure funding in order to create a temporary third lane along the construction zone in some stretches with hills, providing truckers a lane to climb at slower speeds. However, they were unable to secure the funding.
That means the semis trying to climb hills will be forced to drive in one of two lanes, likely causing even more traffic in the area during the construction project.
Cobb said she was worried the prolonged construction project could come with more traffic and danger.
"It is just going to make I-25 more dangerous. I will avoid it," Cobb said.
Fiel noted that, following the completion of the express lanes between Loveland and Fort Collins traffic collisions declined in the region.
