Alaska Beat

Major Seward Highway construction will mean years-long traffic detours

Let the road construction season begin.

State officials announced Monday that a massive, complex upgrade coming to the Seward Highway will make driving in Anchorage even more enjoyable, with construction planned for Alaska's busiest roadway well into 2014.

In the multiphase project, the New Seward will be widened, from four lanes to six. New "multiuse pathways" will be developed along the highway's frontage roads. Four new bridges will be built and the Campbell Creek Trail will be connected beneath them.

Seward Highway interchanges at Dowling and Tudor roads also will be upgraded, according to an announcement from the state Department of Transportation and Public Facilities.

Starting Wednesday, Homer Drive in Midtown Anchorage will be closed between Tudor and International Airport roads for bridge construction and road widening. Once that's done, southbound Seward Highway traffic will be diverted to Homer Drive, a frontage road, as construction begins on the actual highway itself.

Expect southbound Seward Highway traffic heading out of Anchorage to be impacted over the winter, too, with through-traffic detoured along Homer Drive.

Next summer, the same process will impact affect northbound Seward Highway traffic.

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If all goes according to plan, the construction should be completed in two years.

More information was available at the DOT website, AlaskaNavigator.org or 511.alaska.gov, where statewide road closure and detour information is listed. Anchorage road construction info is also detailed on the city website.

Craig Medred

Craig Medred is a former writer for the Anchorage Daily News, Alaska Dispatch and Alaska Dispatch News. He left the ADN in 2015.

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