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M-59 (Corridor 15)
Routing
The Urban Highway Corridor is east-west State Route M-59 in Macomb County, Michigan, from Howell to Sterling Heights. This corridor is in need of upgrading, and the original plan was for the money from the ISTEA/NHS legislation to provide for this purpose. High Priority Appropriation Item 16 provided $29.6 million for widening "a 60-mile portion of highway M-59 from MacComb County to Interstate Route 96 in Howell County, Michigan."
The Funding Issue
The ISTEA/NHS package (of 1991 and 1995) allocated funding for upgrading M-59. However, the money allocated in the legislation for the major reconstruction of a ten mile section of M-59 was redistributed in 1996. The money was used instead to pay for six miles of pavement reconstruction on Interstate 94 in Berrien County, 25 miles of pavement patching on Interstate 94 in St. Clair County, and one mile of pavement reconstruction on Interstate 275 in Oakland County. All of these projects were scheduled to be completed by October 1996, and the total cost was approximately $21 million. This leaves an $8.6 million difference between the appropriation and the cost.
In the meantime, M-59 did not see any improvements. Just when we all thought that M-59 was a lost cause, we hear from MDOT that M-59 is being transformed in late 1997 in the Sterling Heights/Utica/Clinton Township area across Macomb County. From Ryan Road west of Utica to Van Dyke Avenue in downtown Utica, M-59 is being converted from a divided highway to a fully-controlled access freeway with a new interchange at Mound Road.
Between Van Dyke Ave in downtown Utica and M-3/Gratiot Ave north of Mount Clemens, the old two-lane roadway is being converted to a six- to seven-lane divided highway. The portion between Utica Park Blvd east of M-53 and Romeo Plank Road has been completed, with the other sections under way. Currently, M-59 is routed north from the M-3/Gratiot Avenue and M-59/Hall Road intersection north of Mount Clemens to 23 Mile Road, then east concurrently with M-3 to end at Interstate 94. When reconstruction is complete, M-59 will continue east along Hall Rd to end at Interstate 94 at William P. Rosso Highway, shaving approximately three miles from the route. It is unclear if anything will happen with the M-3 or M-29 designations.
M-59 is freeway from University Drive east of downtown Pontiac to Mound Rd west of Utica, while it under construction right now from Mound Rd west of Utica to Van Dyke Ave in downtown Utica, about one mile. Additional funding for M-59 and other Detroit-area transportation projects came from the TEA-21 legislation.
Chris Bessert writes that MDOT has been promising the residents of Livingston County (Howell and Hartland, to be specific) that M-59 will be expanded for two decades now. They have established a "transportation corridor" from Howell to Hartland to facilitate future widening (four lane divided highway, except through Howell, where there just isn't the room). All the new subdivisions -- and there sure are enough of them -- are set back off the highway quite a bit, a la the developments along M-59/Hall Rd through Sterling Heights near Lakeside Mall to accommodate the recently-completed widening there.
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