Michigan DOT: Gateway Project

Paving the road to opportunityMichiganÔÇÖs $170 million Gateway Project will make it easier to move between the US and Canada, generate economic opportunities and knit together a neighborhood. Keith Regan talks with the projectÔÇÖs chief engineer about some of the challenges, including shutting down a highway that runs right through a major US city. The border crossing between Detroit, Michigan, and Windsor, Ontario, is one of the busiest in the world, with thousands of people and millions of dollarsÔÇÖ worth of goods and economic activity making the journey every day.   Getting to one of the main crossing points on the Ambassador Bridge, however, has long been a less-than-efficient process of exiting a major highway, Interstate 75, and using a series of ramps and surface roads. The result has long been bottlenecks and slowdowns that represent lost opportunities. Starting as early as 1994, the Michigan Department of Transportation set out to rectify the situation. Unlike other public construction projects, however, any solution also had to be agreed to by the private company that owns the Ambassador Bridge, which opened in 1929. Striking agreements on how to design the connections and working out the legal and real estate specifics helped keep the project in the slow lane for many years. That has changed, and with as much as $8 million in early-completion bonuses on the tableÔÇöas well as up to $50,000 per day in late-completion penaltiesÔÇöthe Gateway Project is now racing forward toward key deadlines in the fall of 2009, when I-75 is expected to be reopened to traffic, and 2010, when landscaping and other finish work will be completed. The project is necessary because the stretch of I-75 that runs through the city and by the bridge was built in the 1960s and had reached the end of its design life, says Victor Judnic, chief construction engineer for the project. There are also significant economic gains expected, with six dollarsÔÇÖ worth of additional economic activity expected to be generated for each dollar spent on the project, thanks to the increase in international trade and the smoother flow of traffic and commerce that will be made possible by the project. An early decision was made to completely close part of I-75 during the construction part of the work. That helped reduce the project from one expected to take more than four years to one that could be completed in just over two years. Closing the highway to traffic also significantly increases the safety of the work. ÔÇ£It makes it safer for the workers because they can work in a closed area and donÔÇÖt have to worry about getting hit by a car, and itÔÇÖs also safer for the public,ÔÇØ Judnic notes. Of course, closing a busy interstate in a major city can create enormous headaches. The DOT mobilized early to minimize the disruption that the closing caused. Drivers are alerted as far away as Ohio that the stretch of highway is closed in Detroit, with alternate routes suggested. Before work began, the DOT brought in consultants to run simulations on traffic patterns that enabled engineers to see what the impact of each possible alternative would be. ÔÇ£We knew some of what we learned because our engineers are very smart and know the traffic system. But they suggested some key mitigation measures we could make that are in place now and are working well,ÔÇØ Judnic says. In fact, Judnic says the traffic disruption has been minimal. An aggressive public communication and education effort is part of the reason for that, he says, and a slowing economy may have actually come at a good time by reducing traffic overall. The DOT is also utilizing a real-time traffic information system that collects data from sensors around the city, analyzes it and updates real-time traffic signage to quickly suggest alternative routes in the event of an accident or other slowdown. ÔÇ£In this age, mobility is everything. People donÔÇÖt complain about barrels on the road. They just want to know how to get through them quickly,ÔÇØ Judnic says. On the construction side, the project is being overseen by a team of as many as 70 technicians and engineers who are monitoring the work in the field every day, ensuring that specifications are being followed, handling requests for information and ensuring the project remains on track for completion. To keep it all straight, the DOT has used a dedicated Website through which all questions and issues, updated shop drawings and other information moving between the owner and contractor flows. A site administrator fields all the information that comes into the site and helps distribute it to the right sourceÔÇösuch as the design team or executives at the DOT itself. The data comes back to the administrator, who then posts it to the site, which is in addition to the main project Website where timelines, updates and other information is kept. ÔÇ£Everybody who is involved has the ability to get questions and answers from a single place. And itÔÇÖs all electronic, which means we avoid dealing with a lot of paper,ÔÇØ says Judnic. ÔÇ£The contractor probably has 30 or 40 people of its own out there in the field, so thatÔÇÖs 100 people who might need to interact with each other and with the rest of the team. Having a central processing point for that has been very helpful.ÔÇØIn addition to the reconstruction of I-75 and the construction of new ramps to directly connect the interstate to the Ambassador Bridge, the project also includes a new pedestrian bridge that will reconnect the east and west sections of a Detroit neighborhood known as Mexicantown, which was essentially bifurcated by the construction of the highway. That bridge will also become a focal point as drivers enter Detroit from the north. The cable-stay pedestrian bridgeÔÇöthe first of its type in the stateÔÇöwill use a single tall pylon in the center alongside the highway. Already, longer-term planning is under way to look at the possible construction of another bridge crossing into Canada, one that would likely be publicly controlled. That is more of a long-range problem, with the more immediate focus remaining on completing the current construction and getting I-75 fully opened on schedule. ÔÇ£We have our challenges and things that come up,ÔÇØ Judnic says, ÔÇ£but the bottom line is to deliver the project on time and on budget, and we know weÔÇÖll get there.ÔÇØ ┬á