I-440 Repair May Be Sped Up Via Shutdown

NASHVILLE, TN -- Relief from the city-circling nightmare that is Interstate 440 may come sooner rather than later, but there could be heartburn in the meantime.

The Tennessee Department of Transportation is considering using its expedited repair process on what was to be a three-year overhaul of the much-lamented Nashville beltway.

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Wednesday, the department said it would consider contractors' proposals for a repair plan that would close half of I-440 at a time, which could cut the project's completion time by more than a third. Under the normal repair plan, the entire road would be reduced to two lanes during the three-year process.

"Preliminary traffic models have shown that reducing I-440 to two lanes in each direction for a three year period would result in near-constant heavy traffic queues on I-440 and dramatically increase congestion on surrounding routes," TDOT said in a statement.

Contractors are being asked to submit plans that would essentially close the road in two segments with all the repairs done on each segment during its respective closure.

The segments would divided by I-440's intersecting interstates: the first from I-65 to I-24 and the second from I-24 to I-40. Under the TDOT timeline, the first segment would close in January 2019 and repairs would take three months. The second segment would have to be re-opened by mid-November 2019 with a $400,000 daily penalty if a November complete date isn't met.

Proposals under the expedited schedule are due to the state by July. Preliminary work would begin in November.

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