Rebuilding a Highway: Improving the I-44/U.S. 65 interchange

After all, it’s not every day that the department undertakes a project using enough concrete to build a sidewalk from Springfield to Rolla. It’s not every day that the department constructs a highway interchange that uses amounts of steel equivalent to the weight of 350 new Volkswagens, either.

MoDOT is trying to help drivers using the interchange of Interstate 44 and U.S. Highway 65. The state is remaking the current cloverleaf design at the intersection, installing a new flyover ramp connecting northbound Highway 65 to westbound I-44. The $25.2 million project also includes rebuilding the ramp connecting northbound to eastbound traffic, as well as repaving all of northbound Highway 65 on both sides of the interchange and rebuilding a bridge over I-44.

It’s the largest project, in dollar value, ever undertaken in MoDOT’s Springfield region, according to Adam Humphrey, senior construction inspector for MoDOT in Springfield, though other projects statewide, including the rebuilding project for I-64 west of St. Louis and the redesign of the Highway 71, Interstate 435 and Interstate 470 interchange in Kansas City, cost more.

A project the size of the I-44/U.S. 65 interchange requires a lot of materials.

The most visibly imposing pieces are the 52 girders supporting the ramp decks. All of those beams have to be custom-made – no two beams are the same length or weight, according to T.J. Stastny, construction manager with Emery Sapp & Sons Inc., the firm awarded the bid for the project.

He said the girders range from 35 feet to 135 feet in length and weigh up to 90,000 pounds.

Columbia-based Emery Sapp & Sons Inc. focuses on site preparation and infrastructure work for municipalities, airports and utilities. The I-44/U.S. 65 project began in July and is scheduled for completion in May 2008; however, the company earns an additional incentive of $250,000 if the project is completed by Dec. 1 of this year. Stastny said the company is on pace to meet that early deadline.

In order to meet that deadline, the affected areas of I-44 will be shut down for a weekend in July. Stastny said the 50.5-hour shutdown is to ensure driver safety while the U.S. 65 bridge over the interstate is demolished.

Emery, Sapp & Sons Inc. is no stranger to working in the Springfield area. The company worked on the $10.9 million runway reconstruction and taxiway project at Springfield-Branson National Airport completed in December 2002.

Nuts & Bolts

Beams

Manufactured by PDM Bridge in Wausau, Wis., and brought in by Emery Sapp & Sons on flatbed trucks, the beams supporting the new flyover ramp have to be custom-built, as the curved shape of the ramp requires that no two beams are the same size or weight.

Length: Varies from 35 feet to 135 feet

Weight: Varies from 10,000 pounds to 90,000 pounds

Number to be used: 52

Diaphragms

Diaphragms are installed between beams that are next to each other to create stability.

Dimensions: Approximately 8 feet by 10 feet

Number to be used: 288

Concrete

Most of what will be visible when the project is complete will be concrete – and there’s a lot of it. The project uses enough to build a 4-foot-wide sidewalk from Springfield to Rolla.

Weight: 116 million pounds, or 58,000 tons

Total to be used: 29,000 cubic yards

Reinforcement steel

The new interchange is held together by reinforced steel. Despite the massive quantities to be used, none of it will be visible upon the project’s completion.

Weight: More than 1 million pounds

Bolts

Where two beams meet, steel plates are bolted into place to hold the beams together. Each connection requires bolts on each side and on the top and bottom of the connection.

Total to be used: 20,000

Dirt

A lot of dirt will be moved for the project: 153,000 cubic yards, not counting the additional 75,000 cubic yards being brought in. Combined, it’s enough dirt to fill a football field, including the end zones, to a height of more than 106 feet.

Total to be moved/used: 208,000 cubic yards, or 5.6 million cubic feet