Groundbreaking Held For C-470 Express Lanes Project
LONE TREE, Colo. (CBS4) - Officials broke ground Wednesday on a new construction project to expand a stretch of C-470 where traffic regularly bottlenecks.
Officials are adding express lanes on the highway from Interstate 25 to Wadsworth Boulevard. They will also be realigning some curves and replacing bridges.
The C-470 Express Lanes Project is meant to ease congestion woes on an older stretch of highway that was never meant to see the amount of traffic it does.
The project will cost $276 million and it will be paid for though federal, state and local funding.
Douglas County is stepping up for a chunk of that price tag. It will also be county residents baring the brunt of the construction headache, which will be phased in over a period of several years.
"If people will bear with us for the next two and a half years, we always try to structure things so that we can minimize impact. And if you can think toward the future (there will be) less congestion," said Colorado Department of Transportation spokesman Shailen Bhatt.
Construction work for the project is set to begin next month and is expected to wrap up by the spring of 2019.
Some residents who are upset about the upcoming construction have filed a preliminary injunction in an attempt to block the project.
