Orange barrels to go up on Parkway West
Drivers heading to Pittsburgh for a night on the town or a weekend ball game may want to plan for a longer trip.
Starting in the middle of the summer, the state Department of Transportation plans to work on the Parkway West (Interstate 376) between Interstate 79 and the Fort Pitt Tunnel, as well as the tunnel itself.
The project, expected to cost between $48 and $51 million, consists of milling and resurfacing, extending acceleration and deceleration ramps, shoulder reconstruction and deck replacement of the three bridges at the Carnegie interchange.
“We will be maintaining traffic during peak hours throughout the project,” said Steve Cowan, spokesman for PennDOT’s District 11 headquartered in Bridgeville. “It is such a high-traffic route, to restrict lanes would create major tie-ups.”
Four weekend closures in each direction are planned for 2015 so that paving work can be done. Additional overnight and weekend lane closures also will occur.
Other improvements include bridge preservation work, concrete median barrier replacement, guard rail installation, two overhead sign replacements, drainage repairs to retaining walls and existing signs, new pavement markings and sign updates.
The project will be completed in December 2015 or early 2016, Cowan added.
PennDOT planned to start repairs this summer inside the Fort Pitt Tunnel. Ceiling hangers will be replaced and repairs will be made to the lighting. The work was estimated to cost between $3 and $4 million and would have been done in the fall of 2015. But Cowan said that a decision will be made in the next month as to whether that project will proceed as planned or if the scope will change.
“The project had been to replace the ceiling and a water line,” Cowan said. “But now under consideration is removing the ceiling. If that is done, there would be full weekend closures.”
The ceilings were removed from the Liberty and Squirrel Hill tunnels in recent years.
A second project on the parkway westbound will see the reconstruction of the shoulder between the Rosslyn Farms and I-79 interchanges to add another westbound lane. Additional work includes installation of sound walls and sign updates. This project, estimated to cost between $3 and $4 million, will be done by the spring of 2015.
Work also will be done on I-79 between the ramps to the Parkway West and just south of the Heidelberg/Kirwan Heights interchanges.
Overnight and weekend lane closures will be scheduled. The project, expected to cost between $2 and $2.5 million, also will include work on ramps at the Heidelberg/Kirwan Heights, Carnegie and parkway interchanges. When the ramps are closed, there will be detours.
The project is expected to start in July and be completed in the fall.