ST. GEORGE — Multiple road and related projects were showcased at the annual Dixie Regional Transportation Expo held Tuesday. There are many continuing projects and some new ones on the horizon, with others set to wrap up sometime this year.
This is the second article covering the 2024 Dixie Regional Transportation Expo. The first was published Thursday morning and features many of the transportation projects undertaken by the city of St. George. What follows are project highlights from the Utah Department of Transportation, Washington County and its municipalities and others.
UDOT: Extra lanes, interchanges and rumble strips
UDOT spokesman Kevin Kitchen said the project of primary focus right now is widening Interstate 15.
“What we’re focused on at this point is simply what we’ve originally looked at and that is widening (Interstate 15) to get a new lane in either direction between the two existing interchanges we have in St. George,” he said.
This is set to take place between I-15 exits 6 and 8 (Bluff Street and St. George Boulevard) and is expected to begin in 2025 and take around 18 months to complete. Once underway, this project will also see the replacement of the highway bridges over 700 South.
A new I-15 interchange has been proposed for 700 South with a preliminary design chosen last fall. Road planners had hoped to build the interchange in conjunction with the highway widening, but a lack of funding has postponed the project for the time being.
Construction on the Main Street/Exit 11 Interchange in Washington City also continues with that project possibly wrapping up later this year. As for the Main Street portion of the project, the contractor involved is set to pave the north side of the road in the next two weeks while the south side will follow later, Kitchen said in an email to St. George News.
“Passage for the general public (on Main Street) is anticipated sometime in March,” he said.
Accompanying the building of the Main Street interchange is UDOT’s widening of I-15 between the Green Springs/Exit 10 and Washington Parkway/Exit 13 interchanges. This project is expected to conclude by the end of summer with travel possibly returning to normal around the start of August.
Work is also being done on a part of state Route 18 related to rumble strips and lane striping to make the road more cyclists friendly, Kitchen said.
Making its debut at this year’s transportation expo was UDOT’s “Truck Smart” program. The program promotes driver safety and awareness when sharing the road with semitractor-trailers.
UDOT projects slated for 2025 include repaving of portions of St. George Boulevard and Bluff Street.
Washington City: New SR-7 connection and intersection improvements
While UDOT continues to work on the Main Street Interchange, Washington City highlighted two particular projects during the transportation expo – the construction of the George Washington Boulevard-Southern Parkway interchange and the widening of the intersection of Green Springs Drive and Red Hills Parkway.
The new interchange should be completed by the end of summer, said Andy Stevens, Washington City’s assistant public works director.
“That will tie George Washington Boulevard into SR-7 all the way to the new (Red Cliffs Utah Temple),” he said.
Once completed in its entirety (St. George still has to build the extension between River Road and Crosby Way), George Washington Boulevard will become a new east-west corridor between I-15 and the Southern Parkway.
Green Springs Drive and Red Hills Parkway will see a right-turn lane from Green Springs Drive onto Red Hills Drive added while Red Hills Parkway will be expanded to five lanes to accommodate the increasing traffic in the area.
Hurricane: A request to review the city’s proposed transportation projects
“We have an auspicious list of projects and we need to narrow that down to just a few that we can financially cover in a five-year period,” Hurricane City Engineer Arthur LeBaron said as he encouraged Hurricane residents to review the city’s five-year capital improvement plan and recommend what they feel will be the best projects to fund moving forward.
Current transportation projects include work on 700 West between State Street and 600 North, which should concluded in a few months, LeBaron said. The 600 North trail project should also finish up by that time, he said.
Upcoming work includes the new construction for 100 North from 200 West to State Street.
Ivins: Old Dixie Highway 91 improvements set to continue
Ivins recently finished the first phase of its Old Dixie Highway 90 improvement project. This included the addition of bike lanes, resurfacing of the roadway between 200 East and Kwavasa Drive and the addition of a trail from 200 East to Fire Lake Park. Two new roundabouts have also been installed on the roadway.
The second phase of the project will continue the bike lanes and resurfacing of the roadway from 600 West to the Ivins City boundary at Fire Lake Park.
A project is also underway to fill gaps in the city’s trail system with the intent to connect it to the Tuacahn Performing Arts Center and Snow Canyon Parkway.
Toquerville: Bypassing the town
Work continues on the Toquerville bypass that was first announced in 2020 and is promoted as a way to help lessen the heavy traffic that passes through the heart of Toquerville as people travel to Zion Nation Park and other parts of the county.
The roadway is also anticipated to prompt new development on the west side of Toquerville that will further aid in decreasing the overall traffic impacts currently felt in the small town.
The road that passes through Toquerville now is state Route 17, also known as Toquerville Road. It begins in LaVerkin and connects to I-15 at the Anderson Junction/Exit 27 interchange. Part of the route north of Toquerville is curved, which has created safety concerns in the past.
The bypass is designed to move traffic away from the small town’s center and will be better suited for the heavy traffic Toquerville wasn’t originally built for. The bypass is being built west of the town with construction estimated to conclude by the end of the year.
Western Corridor and long-term planning
“A lot of questions this year relate to Gap Canyon Parkway and the Divario development and the Western Corridor,” said Myron Lee, the transportation planning manager for the Five County Association of Governments, which includes the Dixie Metropolitan Planning Organization.
The planning organization maps out the county’s road needs for the next 20-40 years and works with UDOT, Washington County and its various municipalities to create a cohesive road map for future roadways and other transportation projects.
Gap Canyon Parkway, which lies on the western side of St. George in the Divario development, is slated to connect to Old Dixie Highway 91 in Santa Clara sometime in the future. Lee said funding is being sought for the Santa Clara portion of the roadway and that the overall Western Corridor project is a part of its long-term planning.
The future roadway between the Divario development and Santa Clara is seen as a way to help alleviate congestion appearing on nearby Sunbrook Drive and help bring needed services to the area as it develops. It also will ultimately tie into the proposed Western Corridor, which will extend south and connect to the SunRiver community.
An environmental impact study on the project has been funded for 2027, Lee said.
Bureau of Land Management: Northern Corridor and new and improved trails
Members of the local BLM field office were on hand to discuss three projects – the supplemental study being done on the long-contested Northern Corridor, the Revenant mountain bike trail system at West Mountain and the Tempi’po’op (Anasazi) Trail.
Details related to the Northern Corridor and the BLM’s supplemental study can be found here.
The Revenant trail system, which is set to be completed this fall, is located along Old Dixie Highway 91 near the Shivwits reservation and will have 12 miles of machine- and hand-built trails. The trail system’s top elevation is 5,750 feet with a base of 4,330 feet and a downhill descent of 1,450 feet.
The Tempi’po’op Trail, also known as the Anasazi Trail, is getting improvements funded through the Great American Outdoors Act. The trailhead has seen prior improvements from the BLM in the form of better parking, the construction of restrooms and the addition of picnic tables. However, parts of the popular trail have been damaged by major weather events, and the BLM is now taking the opportunity to potentially mitigate future issues.
Improvements to the trail include better accessibility, better drainage and enhanced safety. The project is set to be completed sometime in March.
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