With supply chain and labor shortages, North Split Interchange delayed to April
INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — Indiana residents will need to deal with the predicament of the North Split construction for a few more months.
On Friday, INDOT confirmed that the span that has been shut down for nearly two years won’t reopen until spring.
“The world has been dealing with supply chain and labor shortages for the last 18 months, so that certainly is one of the messages here,” the commissioner of INDOT, Mike Smith, said.
“It is unfortunate because I mean this is a city. We have to get to and from work especially with the holidays happening right now and there are so many people. Big Ten is this weekend. It is troubling to hear for sure,” Kiera Cromer said.
INDOT officials anticipate the north split interchange to be fully open by the end of April, nearly six months later than the original timeline when work started.
They say it’s taken upwards of two years to get some parts and that colder weather makes it difficult to do concrete work.
“We’ve had all kinds of different parts and materials kinds of challenges. Most recently there’s been a pin-up demand on cement in the state, so all kinds of things. We’ve cast a really wide net to try to overcome those, but certainly just the facts I think of what we’re dealing with,” Smith said.
“Certainly we’ve invested on moving up orders on materials to make sure that they are on the ground and we can procure them when they’re available so that when we’re ready for construction in different aspects and phases of the project that we’re ready to do that,” Smith said.
INDOT officials say all bridge decks construction and asphalt paving will be complete by the end of this month.
In the winter, Ohio street will also reopen, not the ramp.
“A reminder, kind of what the public will be getting for this. This is an interchange that produced over 300 crashes every year almost one a day. If you do the math, not quite, but almost one a day,” Smith said. “We feel like we are kind of in the final kick, the final phases of trying to get this thing behind us and so we’ll work diligently to give back as much ground as we possibly can as soon as we can.”
“I don’t want to wait until April to be able to get to work on time. I was slightly late today about five minutes and I left the house early, so that was great,” Avenn Arthur said.
According to INDOT officials, aesthetic work and local street paving are also planned for next year. The public can visit the INDOT website for more updates on the construction.