Slow progress for Beltway upgrades
Motorists who regularly drive the 215 Beltway are familiar with the huge differences between the freeway along the southern and western portions of the highway and what exists in the north.
In the south and the west, the county road is interstate-highway quality, complete with six or more traffic lanes, lengthy exit and entrance ramps and beautifully designed and landscaped overpasses at major intersections.
To the north? Not so much.
On the Beltway north of the Cheyenne Avenue exit, the road curves around Lone Mountain and drops from interstate-highway to four-lane road with traffic lights on the Beltway at Lone Mountain Road and Ann Road.
As the highway curves to the east, it’s a mix of freeway and four-lane road through the exits at Hualapai Way, Durango Drive, Jones Boulevard, Decatur Boulevard and Fifth Street. From Fifth east to Interstate 15, it’s just four lanes, complete with traffic lights at Losee and Pecos roads, Lamb Boulevard and Range Road. Someday, overpasses will be built at those intersections and what serves as the highway today will become the exit and entrance ramps.
Snarls at the traffic lights at the Beltway and Ann and Lone Mountain roads recently inspired some readers to inquire about finishing the Beltway.
The bottom-line answer: you’re in for a long wait.
But maybe that’s the way it should be. After all, the stretch of highway from Fifth to I-15 is pretty barren except for the beautiful Veterans Administration Hospital in North Las Vegas that looks oddly out of place in the middle of nowhere off Pecos Road and the Beltway.
Aside from that, there are virtually no commercial entities and a few single-family residences and apartments off the Beltway.
Tony Illia, a Nevada Transportation Department spokesman, said there are no current plans to upgrade the Beltway to freeway standard between Cheyenne and Hualapai or to eliminate the traffic lights.
As for the rest of the northern piece of the Beltway, Illia said progress will be slow.
“There is a feasibility study being done for an I-15-Beltway north interchange,” he said. “NDOT recently issued a request for proposals, but things remain in the early preliminary stages. There has also been ongoing discussion and contemplation about another ring road encircling the Las Vegas Valley. Potentially, it would reach the edge of the Shadow Mountains on the north side and tie into U.S. Highway 95 and I-15. However, the project’s future relies on a combination of political will, development activity and funding availability.”
There are two other important pieces of the Beltway, one in the works, one on the back burner. Those are the interchanges with major highways, U.S. 95 in the northwest valley and the northern I-15 connection just south of Las Vegas Motor Speedway.
On the U.S. 95 interchange, funding has been identified to begin work on ramps for two key traffic movements, northbound U.S. 95 onto the eastbound Beltway and the westbound Beltway onto southbound U.S. 95.
Construction is expected to begin in the spring and take 20 to 24 months to complete.
The interchange will feature a two-lane, 2,400-foot flyover bridge that will soar 70 feet above the ground at its highest point and move traffic from the westbound Beltway to the southbound U.S. 95.
The I-15 interchange would occur well into the future.
Some community leaders have told me that they’d like the Transportation Department to explore the possibility of moving the Beltway tie-in to I-15 a little farther north — like north of the Speedway.
That would likely be an expensive undertaking, but those who have been trapped in event traffic from the Speedway point out that having an alternative access to the north would be beneficial in those rare occurrences when the city hosts events like NASCAR races or the Electric Daisy Carnival and traffic gets really heavy.
HOLIDAY LEFTOVERS
Speaking of heavy traffic, I-15 south to Southern California was a predictable disaster the Sunday after Thanksgiving as people who celebrated the holiday here made their way home to SoCal.
“Thanksgiving Sunday,” as Brian Hoeft, the director of the Regional Transportation Commission’s Freeway and Arterial System of Transportation, calls it, is the worst of four holiday-weekend travel periods on I-15.
The cause of the mess is the three lanes of I-15 narrowing to two at Primm.
Normally, it takes 30 minutes to get from the 215 Beltway to the state line. That Sunday, it took an additional 70 minutes with the worst of it occurring between 10 a.m. and 3:15 p.m.
Hoeft said the other ugly days are the Sundays of the Memorial Day, Fourth of July and Labor Day weekends. Other three-day weekends are slightly easier to deal with.
When traffic on I-15 was at its worst, the dynamic signs north of the Spaghetti Bowl were recommending travel to Southern California by way of U.S. Highway 95 to Searchlight, then west on State Route 164, which becomes Nipton Road at the California border, a distance of about 103 miles compared with 54 miles via I-15.
Overall, delays occurred between 7 a.m. and 8:30 p.m. and the line was about 27 miles long.
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ROAD WORK AHEAD
■ The northbound lanes of Lamb Boulevard from Quail Avenue to Russell Road will be restricted and Lamb from Russell Road to Tarkin Avenue will be closed to all but local residents from Monday through Dec. 22, 7 a.m. to 3 p.m., for a Clark County Water Reclamation District project. Detour signs will be posted.
■ Interstate 15 traffic will be shifted to southbound lanes at Milepost 16 in the Virgin River Gorge in Arizona on Tuesday for the demolition of a bridge that is being replaced. There will be a single lane of traffic in each direction of I-15, but state officials say motorists should expect traffic delays of up to 15 minutes.
■ The on-ramps and off-ramps of U.S. Highway 95 at Flamingo Road will be closed through 5 a.m., Sunday, for the replacement of an overhead sign. Flamingo Road through traffic will remain open.
■ Lane restrictions for a paving and sidewalk project scheduled on Eastern Avenue between St. Rose Parkway and Silverado Ranch Boulevard and the intersection of Coronado Center Drive, Sundays through Thursdays from 7 p.m. to 6 a.m., through the end of 2014.
■ Eastbound lanes on Rue de Monte Carlo near Las Vegas Boulevard South closed through Dec. 31.
■ Intermittent lane closures planned on Whitney Ranch Drive from Russell Road to Arroyo Grande Boulevard through December.
■ Intermittent lane closures planned on Warm Springs Road from Arroyo Grande Boulevard to Boulder Highway in Henderson through December.
■ Lane closures on Main Street to turn Main and Commerce streets into one-way pairs through December.
■ Lane restrictions on Rainbow Boulevard from Ann Road to Tropical Parkway through the end of December.
■ Traffic delays likely on 26 miles of northbound and southbound Interstate 15 between mileposts 69 and 95 through early 2015.
■ Street, sidewalk, lighting and landscaping improvements are scheduled on Bridger Avenue between Main and Sixth streets through April. Traffic will be restricted to a single lane each direction.
■ The northbound sections of Rancho Drive and Decatur Boulevard are part of a street widening project through November. Two lanes will be open in each direction. Other portions of the project will continue through May.
■ Lane restrictions on Grand Teton Drive between Durango Drive and Rainbow Boulevard through May.
GASOLINE PRICES
The average gasoline price Friday in the Las Vegas Valley was $2.77 per gallon. It was $2.78 in Nevada. The national average of $2.59 is down 13 cents from a week ago, down 34 cents from a month ago and down 67 cents from a year ago.
