City to back interstate option - Beloit Daily News: News http://www.beloitdailynews.com/news/city-to-back-interstate-option/artic...

City to back interstate option By Shaun Zinck [email protected] | Posted: Tuesday, January 21, 2014 4:00 pm The City of Beloit will officially support an option for the reconstruction of the at /90 and Interstate 43 tonight during the city council meeting. City officials are asking councilors to support the options that build a connection between Road and Gateway Boulevard. There are five potential options that the Department of Transportation has designed. The options are designated 1A, 2A, 1B, 2B and 3B. The main difference between the 1 and 2 groups is the Gateway to Milwaukee connection. The project would create a more free-flowing access between Interstate 43 and Interstate 39/90. Vehicles on the interstates traveling both directions would be able to continue at highway speeds when moving from one interstate to the other. The design will increase safety over the current cloverleaf configuration at the Interstate 39/90 interchange. Interstate 43 also ends at Milwaukee Road with no off ramp, which increases the likelihood of an accident with vehicles traveling at interstate speeds coming up to a traffic light. The city has long supported the connection between Gateway and Milwaukee, and officials have said in the past the road will help workers in the business district access the restaurants and shops more easily than the other options. The council will vote to support options 2A and 2B. According to the city council packet, the engineering staff reviewed all five options, and found “alternative 2...to be in the best long term interest of the city.” Option 2A will cost about $96 million in total costs including structure, non-structure and real estate acquisition. Option 2B will cost about $117 million in total costs. The main difference is about $18 million more in structure costs between the two. Options 1A and 1B will cost $93 million and $108 million respectfully. City Council President Charles Haynes said in December that the costs between the two groups was close enough that the benefit of adding the connection was well worth it. Traffic numbers according to WisDOT show about 82 percent of vehicles traveling into Beloit come from Interstate 39/90. That translates to about 6,787 vehicles per day, and about 18 percent, or 1,495 vehicles, come to Beloit via Interstate 43. WisDOT anticipates about 30,000 vehicles will use the two interstates by 2040. Steve Marshall, project manager for WisDOT, said design work will continue into this year for the entire Interstate 39/90 project. More stakeholder meetings are expected to continue into this year as well. Marshall said real estate acquisition will start this year as well. Marshall said a few parts of the interstate reconstruction will start this year, but a bulk of the construction will start in 2015. The entire-45-mile, $835 million project will increase traffic to six lanes from Madison south to Wisconsin Highway 26, up to eight lanes from Highway 26 to County Highway O in Janesville and then again to six from Highway O to the state line.

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