Last weekend Webber Construction reopened the Fredericksburg
Road overpass bridge. Early.
Not only was the bridge opened nearly a full work-week ahead
of schedule, but the weekend closures scheduled were out of the way early. Rather than have the eastbound main lanes of I-10 shut down near Huebner Road for the whole weekend, crews got things opened back up Saturday afternoon.
That's a double-win.
With that major milestone on this 30-month project (which, at the current pace, will finish up somewhere around the end of 2014), the most logical question out there is: what's next?
Well, for now we're working on the storm drain structures on the west end of the project and the turnaround bridge at UTSA Boulevard. We've closed - permanently - the westbound entrance ramp near Huebner Oaks shopping center to allow us to work on the expansion of the frontage road. That work will be away from the business side of the frontage road, meaning we won't be clogging up any driveways.
We'll also be working on the westbound exit ramp to Woodstone, which will be the exit for Woodstone and DeZavala when we're all done. We need to add a lane to that ramp, which is why there's so much barrier right there. We're just setting up a safe work zone.
Now, for the biggest milestone yet. That's right: we haven't even started work on the biggest milestone of the project. That milestone - or, rather, those milestones (there are two involved) - involves the DeZavala overpass bridge. We need to lift the bridge a bit, and will need to widen and lengthen the bridge in the process. Turnarounds at DeZavala will be closed during this work, and you'll see some overnight closures on DeZavala at I-10 from time to time. The main lanes will be skinnied down to make room for the work (though we're keeping three lanes in each direction).
In short, it's going to be a little rough. And it's going to last for nearly a full year.
But it's unlikely to begin until the end of this year. It's in the best interests of absolutely everybody involved - you, me, the contractor ... everyone - to finish up some other work in the UTSA-DeZavala corridor before starting this milestone. We'll be sure to keep everyone posted on a more specific date when it's available.
For now, let's just revel for a moment in the fact we finished our Fredericksburg Road overpass milestone a bit early.