Stretch of I-15 to close for road work near downtown Las Vegas

Pave-A-Palooza rolls on this weekend, and it will be anything but a party for Las Vegas Valley motorists.

Interstate 15 southbound between the Spaghetti Bowl and Sahara Avenue will shut to traffic from 10 p.m. Friday until 5 a.m. Monday, the Nevada Department of Transportation announced Tuesday.

The marathon closure is needed for paving and striping work as part of Project Neon, the $1 billion, 4-mile-long widening of I-15 between the Spaghetti Bowl and Sahara.

Motorists will be detoured to U.S. Highway 95 northbound to the Rancho Drive exit. Motorists will head south on Rancho for around 2 miles until they reach the I-15 southbound onramp just past Sahara.

NDOT chose a full closure because of safety issues it has encountered in the past with partial closures.

In 2011, NDOT resurfaced I-15 between Tropicana and the Spaghetti Bowl, closing three lanes and leaving two open, which presented dangerous work conditions for the crews, according to Tony Illia, NDOT spokesman.

“NHP wrote about 200 citations for work zone violations in four hours,” Illia said. “FAST (traffic cameras) captured vehicles traveling through the work zone at 70 mph.”

With the I-15 closures motorists can expect the following closures:

* The U.S. 95 north and southbound ramps to I-15 southbound will be closed from 9 p.m. Friday until 5 a.m. Monday.

* The D Street onramp to I-15 southbound will be closed from 8 p.m. Friday until 6 a.m. Monday.

* The High Occupancy Vehicle flyover from U.S. 95 to I-15 will be closed from 8 p.m. Friday until 6 a.m. Thursday.

* The Rancho Drive onramp to I-15 southbound will be closed from 8 p.m. Friday until 6 a.m. Monday.

* The U.S. 95 southbound offramp to Martin Luther King Boulevard will be closed from 8 p.m. Friday until 6 a.m. Monday.

* The Martin Luther King Boulevard onramp to I-15 southbound will be closed from 8 p.m. Friday until 6 a.m. Monday.

* The Pinto Lane onramp to I-15 southbound will be closed from 8 p.m. Friday until 6 a.m. Monday.

* The Charleston Boulevard onramp to I-15 southbound will be closed from 8 p.m. Friday until 6 a.m. Monday

* The Neon Gateway onramp to I-15 southbound will be closed from 8 p.m. Friday until 6 a.m. Monday.

Crews are applying a special crumb rubber asphalt mix, incorporating shredded tires for a smoother, quieter ride.

Crumb rubber lasts twice as long as traditional asphalt pavement and creates a better friction surface with less wet weather splashing.

It also recycles used tires that otherwise would end up in a landfill, with Project Neon paving roughly using 60,000 discarded tires.

Project Neon is 96 percent finished and scheduled for completion by mid-July.

Contact Mick Akers at makers@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-2920. Follow @mickakers on Twitter.