Pennsylvania

[seicer]

Thanks for the clarification on the Harris Bridge. It was listed as a major update. When was it substantially rebuilt? The superstructure seems to be in quite a good shape.

[Roadsguy]

Thanks for the clarification on the Harris Bridge. It was listed as a major update. When was it substantially rebuilt? The superstructure seems to be in quite a good shape.

I don't know if it was totally rebuilt or simply widened, but the section from the York Split to 19th Street was reconstructed in the 1980s and widened to six lanes. The design seemed to indicate intent to extend the widening east, but obviously that never happened and now that whole section will eventually be totally rebuilt.

The bridge will be widened, though, when/if they get around to revisiting the long-term West Shore section improvements. I believe the intent is to widen it to 10 lanes, either carrying that all the way to 581 or having it drop to eight before 581.

EDIT: The overview video and plans from the open house have been posted on the project website: http://www.i-83beltway.com/public-meeting.php

[CentralPAGal]

The bridge will be widened, though, when/if they get around to revisiting the long-term West Shore section improvements. I believe the intent is to widen it to 10 lanes, either carrying that all the way to 581 or having it drop to eight before 581.

I believe the concept calls for 10 lanes all the way to 581, with 6 mainline lanes through the interchange.

With things moving forward with the east shore stuff and plans for north York, I wonder if they're gonna start a study on reconstructing and/or widening the highway between the west shore section and York. At least fix some of the ramps, clustered interchanges near the turnpike and the narrow median...

[Roadsguy]

The bridge will be widened, though, when/if they get around to revisiting the long-term West Shore section improvements. I believe the intent is to widen it to 10 lanes, either carrying that all the way to 581 or having it drop to eight before 581.

I believe the concept calls for 10 lanes all the way to 581, with 6 mainline lanes through the interchange.

With things moving forward with the east shore stuff and plans for north York, I wonder if they're gonna start a study on reconstructing and/or widening the highway between the west shore section and York. At least fix some of the ramps, clustered interchanges near the turnpike and the narrow median...

Maybe my grandkids will be able to drive fully-six-lane I-83 to York at the rate they're going, and considering how long it took them to get from the Master Plan study to this preliminary design.

[CentralPAGal]

Not quite new news, but I don't believe I've seen it posted. The preferred alternative for the southern section of the CSVT is on the project's website. Looks like its been there for a bit, but I haven't checked in a while.
http://www.csvt.com/maps/pdfs/58758_Board13-EastAlt-04_May2018.pdf

[Beltway]

Not quite new news, but I don't believe I've seen it posted. The preferred alternative for the southern section of the CSVT is on the project's website. Looks like its been there for a bit, but I haven't checked in a while.
http://www.csvt.com/maps/pdfs/58758_Board13-EastAlt-04_May2018.pdf

Alignment revised to avoid the ash basins.  While there was the advantage of using space not utilized by people, it was deemed too difficult to build a highway thru there, needing to either remove/relocate the material or somehow bridge over it.

[qguy]

Not quite new news, but I don't believe I've seen it posted. The preferred alternative for the southern section of the CSVT is on the project's website. Looks like its been there for a bit, but I haven't checked in a while.
http://www.csvt.com/maps/pdfs/58758_Board13-EastAlt-04_May2018.pdf

Alignment revised to avoid the ash basins.  While there was the advantage of using space not utilized by people, it was deemed too difficult to build a highway thru there, needing to either remove/relocate the material or somehow bridge over it.

Upon further examination, the fly ash basins turned out to be far more unstable than they appeared from the initial geotechnical surveys. The design team thought the roadway could be built upon fill atop the basins, but the material in some of them is still slurry-like after all these years and will never be a stable base. Bridging over them is simply a nonstarter because of cost, so the only recourse is to avoid them.

Good call. Get the pain of redesign and delay over with now instead of dealing with an expressway that's continuously falling apart for generations.

[Beltway]

Alignment revised to avoid the ash basins.  While there was the advantage of using space not utilized by people, it was deemed too difficult to build a highway thru there, needing to either remove/relocate the material or somehow bridge over it.

Upon further examination, the fly ash basins turned out to be far more unstable than they appeared from the initial geotechnical surveys. The design team thought the roadway could be built upon fill atop the basins, but the material in some of them is still slurry-like after all these years and will never be a stable base. Bridging over them is simply a nonstarter because of cost, so the only recourse is to avoid them.
Good call. Get the pain of redesign and delay over with now instead of dealing with an expressway that's continuously falling apart for generations.

At least 3 million cubic yards of material, so relocating it would be very expensive and there would be the problem of finding a disposal area that could receive it.

[noelbotevera]

In other news, they're finally getting somewhere with filling in the Potters Mills gap in US 322. For those unfamiliar with the area, US 322 abruptly stops being a freeway and turns into a 2 lane road about 15 miles outside of State College, and traffic can be hell during football games. The only other alternate route in the area is PA 45, which is also a 2 lane road. So this is a welcome improvement.

Project link (I'm aware it's not PennDOT's website, but it's the most up to date info I can find)

Now I have no idea why they don't completely fill the gap (the project ends west of the US 322/PA 144 intersection) all the way to State College, but honestly, any freeway there is a huge improvement over the two lane road.

Also, I don't know why it took 3 years to build an overpass and an interchange (at Sand Mountain Road). I guess it's just how PennDOT works.

[ixnay]

In other news, they're finally getting somewhere with filling in the Potters Mills gap in US 322.
...

Project link (I'm aware it's not PennDOT's website, but it's the most up to date info I can find.

And within that link is this link...

https://www.penndot.gov/RegionalOffices/district-2/ConstructionsProjectsAndRoadwork/Pages/Potters_Mills_Gap_Transportation_Project.aspx

ixnay

[MASTERNC]

Looks like PennDOT is starting the speed camera process with an advertisement for consulting services.  No solicitation for a contractor yet.

[qguy]

Took this picture about a week ago, facing westbound on Tunnel Hill Road just beyond the northwest corner of Lebanon, Pennsylvania. The cut in the bottom half of the picture is an abandoned railroad ROW that is being converted into a trail (an extension of the Lebanon Valley Rail Trail).

The rail line was abandoned sometime after it suffered severe damage from Hurricane Agnes in 1972. (Many rail lines in the region suffered the same fate.) Sometime in the late 1980s PennDOT removed the bridge over the railroad ROW and replaced it with fill. (One less bridge on which to spend money inspecting and maintaining.) PennDOT is now excavating the fill and installing a large concrete box culvert (composed of precast segments, I believe) to allow for an extension of the trail along the old rail line north from its current terminus and trailhead in town.

What's interesting about all of this is that the excavation has revealed that when PennDOT converted the bridge to fill, it did not remove the bridge abutments but merely buried them. They've now been exposed by the excavation. You can see the western abutment in the middle of the image.

The project calls for fill over the box culvert. I don't know whether the old abutments will be removed or reburied. I'll observe and re-post later.

In July 2018 I posted the above and wondered if PennDOT would remove the old bridge abutments or simply rebury them. Well, the project was completed a few weeks ago and the abutments were reburied in place. Here's a pic from 3 Nov from a similar vantage point as the first pic above.



The view is facing west on Tunnel Hill Road. At bottom left can be seen the south portal of the precast concrete tunnel and part of the future Lebanon Valley Rail Trail. I used the panorama function on my phone camera, so the view angle is much wider than the previous image.

Here's a repost of the background information:

Tunnel Hill Road is called that because the Union Canal Tunnel passes beneath it (a few hundred yards to the east of the above pic). Constructed from 1825—1827, it was part of a system of canals and a portage railroad that connected Philadelphia with Pittsburgh over the Allegheny Mountains. It's listed National Historic Landmark and National Historic Civil Engineering Landmark. It's now part of a park which includes a section of the canal. On Sundays during the summer one can take boat tours through it. Here's a pic:



Tunnel Hill Road is just over the crest of the hill atop the canal tunnel.

[Bitmapped]

The new US 219 freeway between Somerset and Meyersdale opens tomorrow, November 21, 2018. WJAC-TV has a segment with some drone footage and a ride-along with the PennDOT district executive: https://wjactv.com/news/local/drone-video-of-us-219-before-it-opens-to-traffic-wednesday-afternoon

[ipeters61]

Something I noticed when looking at US-220 in the Bedford area on Street View is that it appears to be graded (or at least cleared) for a dual highway.  Is there something I'm missing here? https://www.google.com/maps/@40.0076347,-78.5266674,3a,75y,186.74h,77.71t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1s4bQSiYD0bLSUXuT9KiOyVQ!2e0!7i13312!8i6656

[Roadsguy]

Something I noticed when looking at US-220 in the Bedford area on Street View is that it appears to be graded (or at least cleared) for a dual highway.  Is there something I'm missing here? https://www.google.com/maps/@40.0076347,-78.5266674,3a,75y,186.74h,77.71t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1s4bQSiYD0bLSUXuT9KiOyVQ!2e0!7i13312!8i6656

That's just one of the few remaining short sections of super-2 left in Pennsylvania. I don't know how far down they wanted to take the full freeway when it was first being built, but it was once anticipated as a southern extension of I-99 to I-68, though I don't think they're still planning that.

[Beltway]

That's just one of the few remaining short sections of super-2 left in Pennsylvania. I don't know how far down they wanted to take the full freeway when it was first being built, but it was once anticipated as a southern extension of I-99 to I-68, though I don't think they're still planning that.

Yes, that is the US-220 bypass of Bedford that was built around 1970, that section with 2 lanes on a 4-lane limited access right-of-way.

That is on Appalachian Development Highway System Corridor "O" and the corridor still exists but no further construction is planned at this time on the segment between that bypass and the Maryland border.

[ipeters61]

That's just one of the few remaining short sections of super-2 left in Pennsylvania. I don't know how far down they wanted to take the full freeway when it was first being built, but it was once anticipated as a southern extension of I-99 to I-68, though I don't think they're still planning that.

Yes, that is the US-220 bypass of Bedford that was built around 1970, that section with 2 lanes on a 4-lane limited access right-of-way.

That is on Appalachian Development Highway System Corridor "O" and the corridor still exists but no further construction is planned at this time on the segment between that bypass and the Maryland border.

Makes sense.  Thanks for the info!

[Bitmapped]

That's just one of the few remaining short sections of super-2 left in Pennsylvania. I don't know how far down they wanted to take the full freeway when it was first being built, but it was once anticipated as a southern extension of I-99 to I-68, though I don't think they're still planning that.

Yes, that is the US-220 bypass of Bedford that was built around 1970, that section with 2 lanes on a 4-lane limited access right-of-way.

That is on Appalachian Development Highway System Corridor "O" and the corridor still exists but no further construction is planned at this time on the segment between that bypass and the Maryland border.

The wide ROW and rough grading for a second set of lanes extends to Cumberland Road, just north of US 220's intersection with Business 220, the original route. There is also a 1960s-vintage 2-lane bypass of Centerville further south, but it only has a 2-lane ROW.

Traffic flows pretty well on the existing US 220, so there's no need for a major upgrade with Corridor O. I would suggest adding some strategic passing lanes along the route for when traffic backs up behind a slowpoke, but that's really all it needs.

[Beltway]

Yes, that is the US-220 bypass of Bedford that was built around 1970, that section with 2 lanes on a 4-lane limited access right-of-way.
That is on Appalachian Development Highway System Corridor "O" and the corridor still exists but no further construction is planned at this time on the segment between that bypass and the Maryland border.

The wide ROW and rough grading for a second set of lanes extends to Cumberland Road, just north of US 220's intersection with Business 220, the original route. There is also a 1960s-vintage 2-lane bypass of Centerville further south, but it only has a 2-lane ROW.

Maryland built a US-220 relocation about 20 years ago, between I-68 and the PA border.  It is mostly 2 lanes and is built on a 4-lane right-of-way.  This project was built as part of ADHS Corridor "O".

Traffic flows pretty well on the existing US 220, so there's no need for a major upgrade with Corridor O. I would suggest adding some strategic passing lanes along the route for when traffic backs up behind a slowpoke, but that's really all it needs.

We could say the same thing about US-219.  The new 4-lane freeway section that just opened in Somerset County PA bypasses the original US-219 where part only carried about 5,000 AADT. 

I agree that there is not a compelling reason currently to build that segment of Corridor "O" as a new 4-lane freeway, but that option could be pursued in the future if the two states saw a need and decided to.

[qguy]

I agree that there is not a compelling reason currently to build that segment of Corridor "O" as a new 4-lane freeway, but that option could be pursued in the future if the two states saw a need and decided to.

Plus, such an option would have the added attraction of inducing all of us on this forum to argue and complain about I-99 all over again! 

[ipeters61]

I agree that there is not a compelling reason currently to build that segment of Corridor "O" as a new 4-lane freeway, but that option could be pursued in the future if the two states saw a need and decided to.

Plus, such an option would have the added attraction of inducing all of us on this forum to argue and complain about I-99 all over again! 

But it's so catchy! /s

[briantroutman]

Gov. Wolf was on a KDKA call-in program Tuesday, and his brief conversation with the host touched on the issue of transportation funding (at about 2:25 in the recording).

He acknowledges that Acts 44 and 89 (passed during the Rendell and Corbett administrations, incidentally) have put the PTC in an unsustainable cycle of mounting debt and rising toll rates, and he says that there is bipartisan support in Harrisburg for a modification or elimination of the payments from PTC to PennDOT. But unfortunately, this casual conversation doesn't get into the much more complicated topic of how PennDOT–specifically, mass transit subsidies provided under Act 89–would cope with the loss of nearly half a billion dollars per year in funding.

[jemacedo9]

PA 295 being renumbered to PA 297...

https://www.penndot.gov/regionaloffices/district-8/pages/details.aspx?newsid=868

Upon the completion of a recent construction project on Interstate 95 in Bucks County, a portion of the existing limited access roadway was renamed Interstate 295. Due to the potential conflict involved in having two major Pennsylvania traffic routes designated as 295, it was decided that State Route 295 in York County would be renumbered State Route 297.

[Roadsguy]

PA 295 being renumbered to PA 297...

https://www.penndot.gov/regionaloffices/district-8/pages/details.aspx?newsid=868

Upon the completion of a recent construction project on Interstate 95 in Bucks County, a portion of the existing limited access roadway was renamed Interstate 295. Due to the potential conflict involved in having two major Pennsylvania traffic routes designated as 295, it was decided that State Route 295 in York County would be renumbered State Route 297.

Good. Usually PennDOT will just change the internal designation and forget about it, even if the new internal designation makes more sense as a number (PA 99 is SR 0699, northern PA 97 is SR 0197, etc.)

[Alps]

I agree that there is not a compelling reason currently to build that segment of Corridor "O" as a new 4-lane freeway, but that option could be pursued in the future if the two states saw a need and decided to.

Plus, such an option would have the added attraction of inducing all of us on this forum to argue and complain about I-99 all over again! 

US 219 is I-67.