It’s Time to Listen to MoDOT: Poplar Street Bridge Access to I-70 Needs to Disappear

In 2001, after many years of study, public meetings, regional discussion, and E/W Gateway approval, the DOT’s received a Record of Decision (ROD) from the Federal Highway Administration to move forward with the New River Bridge project. This ROD would build a New I-70 River Bridge about one mile north of the Poplar Street Bridge. After I-70 was relocated to the new bridge, the PSB would only carry I-55 and I-64 traffic. As a part of that approved plan, the MO interchange on the PSB was to be rebuilt to eliminate the I-70 connection and build dual I-55 ramps in its place.

This is how MoDOT describes the rather mundane plan to reconfigure Interstate highway traffic in and around downtown St. Louis (full project description and slideshow below). Of course when you're talking about changing a highway, affecting someone's driving habits, the conversation quickly becomes anything but mundane. One might be led to believe that the right driving one's car from point A to point B via a particular route had been enshrined in our Constitution.

The plan since before 2001 has been to "eliminate the I-70 connection and build dual I-55 ramps" at the PSB. This, according to MoDOT would very nearly eliminate traffic back-ups on the PSB and connecting ramps. The redundant I-70 ramps must be removed to make room for dual I-55 ramps, the key to eliminated dangerous traffic conditions. And so MoDOT was apparently surprised in June 2011 when East-West Gateway effectively reinstated the I-70 ramps due to "a belief that removing the I-70 ramps from the PSB would negatively affect the Sauget area in St. Clair County". According to MoDOT, about 3 percent of PSB traffic today travels to and from the Sauget area.