SW Dallas News

Widening the stretch of Interstate 45 from Houston to Galveston has been an ongoing project for the Texas Department of Transportation for the past several years, and it looks as though it will continue for a few years more.

A February update from TxDot shows several widening projects along I-45 have new deadlines that are several months, some more than a year, later than the original ones. 

The widening project between NASA Parkway and Farm-to-Market Road 518 was expected to be completed this fall, but it is now pushed back to the end of 2021. It will cost $99.2 million.

The project from FM 518 to FM 517 was supposed to be complete near the beginning of 2021, but has a new completion date of the beginning of 2022. It will cost $121.7 million.

The project between FM 517 and FM 1764 was originally supposed to be completed in the third quarter of 2022. Its new completion date is the end of 2023 and it will cost $163 million.

TxDot Public Information Officer Danny Perez told Community Impact Newspaper that inclement weather and holiday travel affected the completion dates for projects. Right of way acquisition and utility relocation efforts took longer on the two projects between FM 518 and FM 1764, delaying these projects.

The project to reconfigure the intersection of I-45 and FM 646 was originally scheduled to be performed over the holiday season but was pushed back to March 2019 to reduce negative effects on travelers.

“It is our goal to finish each project as quickly as possible and to minimize impacts on the traveling public. However, there are times during construction we encounter issues that could delay a project,”  Perez said. “Our project teams work to overcome any challenges that may  arise by working with the contractor.”

The widening of I-45 between FM 1764 and FM 519 is expected to be finished in the third quarter of 2025; it will cost $163 million. 

There are still four more widening projects from FM 519 to Galveston that have not been started. Most are expected to begin this summer, with an estimated cost of $385.8 million.