In recent years, the Illinois Department of Transportation has been using full closures of major roadways in the Metro East during construction because it offers three distinct advantages.
“We have found that full closures are safer, faster and cheaper,” said Joel Cumby, IDOT’s District 8 project implementation engineer based in Collinsville. “Now, we will look at it, but we will only use a full closure if we do have good parallel routes, good alternate routes — a good detour.”
IDOT first implemented the strategy on a large scale when it completed the initial phase of its Interstate 255 rehabilitation from Collinsville Road to Illinois 15 throughout Caseyville, East St. Louis and Cahokia Heights in 2020.
The state agency also used a full closure during the second phase of I-255 rehab in Cahokia Heights and Sauget, which wrapped up this past weekend. While repaving the surface of the Poplar Street Bridge last year, IDOT shut down the bridge going one direction over the course of a couple of weekends.
It’s also using a full closure of the north and eastbound lanes of Interstate 55/70 in Collinsville during 17 days of construction right now.
IDOT got the idea from its Missouri counterparts when they completed a massive overhaul of Interstate 64 in St. Louis and St. Louis County about 15 years ago, Cumby said.
Safety is the biggest advantage of full closures. The main reason is that driving conditions don’t change for motorists during construction, and it’s less confusing, the engineer said.
“There's changing conditions while we're changing stages,” Cumby said. “No matter how much we try to get the message out there, it's still an unknown.”
The second phase of I-255’s rehab would have taken two full construction seasons if IDOT had pieced together. Instead, the state agency completed it in 4½ months — more than six weeks ahead of schedule, IDOT said in a news release.
Shutting I-255 down completely also cost IDOT $10 million less than a more conventional project. Additionally, the construction is done better, Cumby said.
“When you can go in and just build it all at once, we found that you get a higher-quality product,” Cumby said.
While it’s not lost on IDOT that a full closure may annoy commuters more, it’s a better alternative when possible, Cumby said.
“We understand it’s an inconvenience,” he said. “Anytime we’re going to go out and do roadwork, it’s going to be inconveniencing somebody. We do our best to look at the big picture to see what is best for the citizens of Illinois.”
