Mar 5, 2018 3 min read

State Department of Transportation Secretary Leslie S. Richards visited Collier Township March 5 to join executives from PennDOT’s districts 11 and 12 to announce that about 146 highway and bridge projects are continuing or will begin in the seven-county area.

Richards said Gov. Tom Wolf announced plans to improve more than 1,100 rural and low-volume roads and rehabilitate 85 bridges owned by municipalities or counties as part of a five-year program, which she called “much-needed projects” for the region.

The district in Allegheny County just received funding to make repairs on Interstate 376 between the Fort Pitt Bridge and Edgewood, where the number of potholes also is increasing.

Other work includes the continuation of the I-376 project near Pittsburgh International Airport. A crossover will be part of the project this year, said Cheryl Moon-Siriani, District 11 executive. That work is expected to resume later this month.

“The eastbound lanes will cross onto the westbound side,” said Moon-Siriani. “Traffic will be maintained at all times.”

Going out for bid later this year will be replacing the bridge at the intersection of Boyce and Mayview roads at the Upper St. Clair and South Fayette Township line. Moon-Sirianni said some utility work may be done this year, but she said traffic is certain to be affected in that area. Traffic is expected to be detoured. The estimated completion date is September 2019.

Nearby, East McMurray Road in Peters Township is scheduled for resurfacing between Route 19 and the Allegheny County line. The state also will be opening bids later this year on a safety-improvement project in North Strabane Township from the intersection of Routes 519, 19 and 980, down Route 519 to the Interstate 79 ramps.

Elsewhere in the region, the biggest project continues to be an initiative to modernize Interstate 70 between Washington and New Stanton, said Joseph Szczur, District 12 executive.

“That is one of the most functionally deficient sections in the interstate system,” Szczur said, adding that the section of I-70 just west on the Monongahela River is the oldest section of interstate in the United States.

“Many parts of the interstates were built in the 1950s and 1960s,” he added. “They were not designed to handle the amount of traffic (we now have), especially truck traffic.”

In Washington County, work is continuing on improvements in the area of the Bentleyville interchange on I-70. Szczur said the project is going well and should be done in December.

Work also is continuing on the reconstruction of the highway between the Beau Street and Route 519 interchanges. Szczur said it is a continuation of the work that was done a few years ago near the Murtland Avenue interchange that included construction of the state’s first diverging diamond interchange.

A bridge rehabilitation will be done on the span that carries Noblestown Road over Robinson Run in Robinson and Mt. Pleasant townships. Several other bridge replacements are planned in other areas of the county as PennDOT continues to address reducing the number of structurally deficient bridges.

Szczur said work should wrap up this summer on reconstructing the intersection of Routes 88 and 837 in the Mon Valley. Work is supposed to start next month to pave a section of Route 837 between Route 88 and the Allegheny County line.