US 31 Hamilton County, Indiana

[silverback1065]

Carmel drive is now open and the crossover should occur sometime this week according to the local news.

[cjw2001]

The crossover appears to be on its way soon. Temp signals are up and bagged and the new portions traffic will use appear to almost be done. On another note, is it me or are some of these exits completely redundant?  Greyhound pass, old meridian,  and rangeline road all seem completely pointless. the rangeline exit has pretty bad weaving issues, almost no distance to merge. Greyhound pass doesn't really need to connect and old meridian can be replaced by 116th to Pennsylvania st easily.

As someone that lives in the area and makes use of the above on a regular basis I can assure you that they are far from pointless.

[silverback1065]

The crossover appears to be on its way soon. Temp signals are up and bagged and the new portions traffic will use appear to almost be done. On another note, is it me or are some of these exits completely redundant?  Greyhound pass, old meridian,  and rangeline road all seem completely pointless. the rangeline exit has pretty bad weaving issues, almost no distance to merge. Greyhound pass doesn't really need to connect and old meridian can be replaced by 116th to Pennsylvania st easily.

As someone that lives in the area and makes use of the above on a regular basis I can assure you that they are far from pointless.

I also live (moved there recently) in the area and use those exits. I shouldn't have said pointless though. Living here now, I do see the reason for the greyhound pass exits (shopping), but I still see rangeline and old meridian as convenient, but not absolutely necessary. I mean if they disappeared now, it wouldn't be the end of the world.
I do see your point now though, they are  more for local traffic.

[cjw2001]

Hamilton County is planning a southbound access from 146th/Lowes Way to Keystone, which will fix the 146th to Keystone access issue.  Not going to happen until at least 2018 however.  http://www.hamiltoncounty.in.gov/881/Keystone-Ramp

[silverback1065]

I'm not sure why they want to connect this to rangeline road, i always thought this was going to be a simple flyover. 

[silverback1065]

The 106th & Illinois St. roundabout is finally open, the annoying 103rd signal is supposed to be gone by next Monday.  Carmel Drive has been paved completely.  Lane shifts will occur from 96th to 103rd as they start to make the new lanes in that area.

[bmeiser]

103rd Street closes tonight.  Traffic shifts to the east side of 31 starting tomorrow night.  The shift is expected to be complete by Friday at which time the 103rd street stoplight will be removed.  Traffic will remain in this configuration through November

116th/Pennsylvania will close for 60 days for roundabout construction when the new 111th Street overpass is completed (around Sept 16th).

http://archive.constantcontact.com/fs123/1112548744559/archive/1122180091675.html

Also, I drove the whole project this weekend and things seem to be getting very close to complete up in Westfield.  Paving on the east side of the road between 161st st and 196th seems to be nearly (if not completely) done and all bridges in this stretch are in various stages of almost done.  Paving on the ramps on the east side of the 191st interchange looks to have begun.  I bet this stretch will be open to traffic, at least in limited form, by the end of the month.  They still have a layer of pavement to put down on the west side.  I'm not sure when they plan on doing that.

[silverback1065]

The speed at which this is getting done is impressive, I can't wait for the new flyover to open at 465.

[silverback1065]

103rd Street closes tonight.  Traffic shifts to the east side of 31 starting tomorrow night.  The shift is expected to be complete by Friday at which time the 103rd street stoplight will be removed.  Traffic will remain in this configuration through November

116th/Pennsylvania will close for 60 days for roundabout construction when the new 111th Street overpass is completed (around Sept 16th).

http://archive.constantcontact.com/fs123/1112548744559/archive/1122180091675.html

Also, I drove the whole project this weekend and things seem to be getting very close to complete up in Westfield.  Paving on the east side of the road between 161st st and 196th seems to be nearly (if not completely) done and all bridges in this stretch are in various stages of almost done.  Paving on the ramps on the east side of the 191st interchange looks to have begun.  I bet this stretch will be open to traffic, at least in limited form, by the end of the month.  They still have a layer of pavement to put down on the west side.  I'm not sure when they plan on doing that.

Will the 103rd and Pennsylvania roundabout be removed?  It doesn't really serve much of a purpose now.  They removed the one at Illinois st. 

[bmeiser]

I haven't heard.  I believe 103rd is going to cul-de-sac west of the entrances to the business and there's about a mile or so of 103rd east of that intersection so I suppose it would serve some purpose.  Probably would be cheaper to just leave it.

[cjw2001]

There is no mention in any of the plans for removal of the 103rd and Penn roundabout.

http://us31hamiltoncounty.in.gov/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Sheet1_Carmel1.pdf

Also over the last few days I've gotten all the new ramps added to Google Maps from the 465 interchange up to the 116th interchange, along with the new roundabouts at 106th and 116th.  Most of this is in "started" status on mapmaker so the inactive ramps and roundabouts won't be visible yet on the published google maps but they are drawn and ready to go when the time comes for them to go live.  103rd has been marked closed for maintenance for now.  I'm holding off on permanent removal until later because the last time I tried that the Google staff just added them back as live roads.   Will be better to leave them marked as closed for now until the ramps open so they aren't tempted to screw with it.

[Bulldozerman]

I emailed the US 31 website and they said that the 196 street light will be torn out and 191st street exit open in the next few days.  Can't wait for this to be done as this section was originally supposed to be completed last Thanksgiving!  The crew down at 106th and 116th appear to be working at a much quicker pace than the crew up at 191st/196th.

On a side note, when are the construction cones going to be removed around 146th/161st?  There hasn't been any real construction there for a year now, just Westfield/Carmel cops sitting there writing speeding tickets.

[silverback1065]

I emailed the US 31 website and they said that the 196 street light will be torn out and 191st street exit open in the next few days.  Can't wait for this to be done as this section was originally supposed to be completed last Thanksgiving!  The crew down at 106th and 116th appear to be working at a much quicker pace than the crew up at 191st/196th.

On a side note, when are the construction cones going to be removed around 146th/161st?  There hasn't been any real construction there for a year now, just Westfield/Carmel cops sitting there writing speeding tickets.

not until the whole thing is done, they don't want random 6 funneling down to 4 lane sections.  I'm surprised 196th didn't get a bridge like 111th did.

[cjw2001]

I just marked the southbound ramps and the roundabout as completed on Google Maps for the new 191st street interchange.

The northbound ramps should open by Saturday per today's newsletter from the state.  They will stay invisible til then.

[mukade]

It definitely looked like the northbound lanes would open today. Pavement markings at the tie-ins were removed, the whole thing looked to be striped, in-pavement reflectors were being installed, and final landscaping was being planted. The traffic light at 196th has been removed and access to that last remaining business on US 31 south of 191st St has now been blocked thanks to the 191st St. interchange.

The southern part of the US 31 project from 103rd to north of 116th Street is also looking good with a lot of bridge beams staged and ready to be put in at 116th Street. The only part that seems to be going very slow is that flyover from eastbound I-465 to northbound US 31. There is progress, but it is slow. The westbound I-465 ramp to northbound US 31 is coming along.

On US 31 at SR 28, the venerable Sherrill's Eat Here and get Gas is still open, but the letting for the new interchange there is scheduled for 11/10.

[cjw2001]

The northbound lanes from 161st to SR 38 are open - I just did a test drive.  People are driving like a bat out of hell -- I was going 10 mph over the construction speed limit and getting passed like crazy.  On the way back south had someone try to run me off the road by creating their own imaginary lane to pass where none existed in the still single lane section.

I've just removed the intersection at 196th on Google Mapmaker but will take some time before that propagates to Google Maps.

[silverback1065]

The northbound lanes from 161st to SR 38 are open - I just did a test drive.  People are driving like a bat out of hell -- I was going 10 mph over the construction speed limit and getting passed like crazy.  On the way back south had someone try to run me off the road by creating their own imaginary lane to pass where none existed in the still single lane section.

I've just removed the intersection at 196th on Google Mapmaker but will take some time before that propagates to Google Maps.

They'll have cops lined up chomping at the bit to give out tickets in no time.

[ysuindy]

came back through at 10 p.m. tonight headed southbound.  Looked like there were still some barrels in the northbound lanes between 146 and 161st.

Now that the northbound lanes are open, I presume work starts Monday on restoring all lanes of southbound traffic.

[silverback1065]

came back through at 10 p.m. tonight headed southbound.  Looked like there were still some barrels in the northbound lanes between 146 and 161st.

Now that the northbound lanes are open, I presume work starts Monday on restoring all lanes of southbound traffic.

I hope so, the temporary configuration in that area screws up traffic. I drive 191st today and literally saw 2 people attempt treating the roundabout as a normal intersection (trying to make a left turn as if it were at a typical 4 way stop), resulting in near disaster. I guess it will take some time for people to get used to it, but considering the area I was quite surprised.

[Revive 755]

The northbound lanes from 161st to SR 38 are open - I just did a test drive.  People are driving like a bat out of hell -- I was going 10 mph over the construction speed limit and getting passed like crazy.  On the way back south had someone try to run me off the road by creating their own imaginary lane to pass where none existed in the still single lane section.

Doesn't help that the speed limit is insanely low on US 31 - 40 mph for a freeway with decent interchange spacing?

[silverback1065]

The northbound lanes from 161st to SR 38 are open - I just did a test drive.  People are driving like a bat out of hell -- I was going 10 mph over the construction speed limit and getting passed like crazy.  On the way back south had someone try to run me off the road by creating their own imaginary lane to pass where none existed in the still single lane section.

Doesn't help that the speed limit is insanely low on US 31 - 40 mph for a freeway with decent interchange spacing?

That is not the real speed limit, its just the construction speed limit. Hopefully the real limit is 60

[tdindy88]

Was it me, or was there no signage along US 31 from 146th Street northward that mentioned the community of Westfield, even though the signs at I-465 and US 31 (from the west anyway) placed Westfield over Carmel (that one city with the second-largest office district in the state and numerous companies.) I know INDOT doesn't announce communities when I highway goes through them, Kentucky and Tennessee (with two notable exceptions) don't either, but when I pass by SR 32 off of US 31 I'm thinking Westfield, not Lebanon or Noblesville, there's better ways to get to those two highways than 31. Probably more of a control city question than anything else, and I'm from South Indy so there's no bitterness over names one way or the other.

[silverback1065]

Was it me, or was there no signage along US 31 from 146th Street northward that mentioned the community of Westfield, even though the signs at I-465 and US 31 (from the west anyway) placed Westfield over Carmel (that one city with the second-largest office district in the state and numerous companies.) I know INDOT doesn't announce communities when I highway goes through them, Kentucky and Tennessee (with two notable exceptions) don't either, but when I pass by SR 32 off of US 31 I'm thinking Westfield, not Lebanon or Noblesville, there's better ways to get to those two highways than 31. Probably more of a control city question than anything else, and I'm from South Indy so there's no bitterness over names one way or the other.

They don't have signs, they should have one that says "Westfield exit 132". It doesn't mention Carmel on 31 because that exit is already in  Carmel.

[tdindy88]

It doesn't stop Indianapolis from being mentioned within Indianapolis city limits all over I-465. Junctions with 465 and both I-65 and I-70 all mention Indy and it's well within Marion County.

Looking back, what I think should be needed on I-465 approaching Exit 31 from the west and Exit 33 from the east should be a sign saying "Carmel, next 2 exits.) That is consistent with INDOT signing around the state. Likewise, on US 31 heading north there should be "Carmel, next 5 exits," followed by "Westfield, next 4 exits) and something similar heading southbound. I mean if they go out of their way to mention hospitals and baseball fields, perhaps you should tell people what cities the highway is passing through.

Thinking on that now, I-69 should have a Fishers, next 3 exits sign heading north toward Exit 203 and I-65 south should have a Greenwood, next 3 exits for I-65 approaching Exit 101. These are both accounting for new exits in both areas to be built in the future.

Otherwise, the highway is looking nice.

[iBallasticwolf2]

Some photos of construction on US 31 in Carmel from TODAY.




Flyover construction at the I-465 and US 31 interchange.




General US 31 construction between I-465 and Keystone Parkway.