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Southern Beltway and Mon-Fayette Expressway Projects
Sunday, January 23, 2000 By Steve Thomas, Post-Gazette Staff Artist
About half of the 65 miles that comprise the Mon-Fayette Expressway are open to traffic by the fall of 2001. Here's a map locating the road and a status report on the expressway and related Southern Beltway, two toll roads under construction by the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission.
Southern Beltway
(A) This spring, a consultant is to start final design of the 6-mile "Findlay Connector" from Route 22, Washington County, to Pittsburgh International Airport.
(B) and (C) Environmental studies and alignment issues are still being resolved on these two sections that will link up with the Mon-Fayette Expressway, intersect with
I-79 and create a beltway along the Allegheny-Washington border.
Mon-Fayette Expressway
(7) The Y-shaped, $1 billion northern section, with connections to the Parkway East, has been subdivided into four pieces for study purposes and is expected to take another three years.
(6) More than $350 million of construction is under way on 17 miles of expressway from I-70 to Route 51 in Jefferson Hills, a section that is to be opened late next year.
(5) On Oct. 12, 1990, state Sen. J. Barry Stout tossed quarters into a toll plaza coin basket to officially open the first 6-mile section from Brownsville to I-70 in Fallowfield.
(4) The federal government has approved a draft environmental impact study for the 15-mile, $400 million Brownsville-to-Uniontown section. Hearings were held last month.
(3) PennDOT used special federal funds to build the 4-mile, so-called Chadville section, part of new Route 43 finished in November 1992.
(2) Most of the 7.8-mile "Mason Dixon link" south of Uniontown is finished and scheduled to open March 1 as far as Gans Road, near the border. The toll for cars: 75 cents.
(1) West Virginia has awarded a $13.9 million contract to build the first two miles of the 4-mile "missing link" to I-68, a section that may not be finished before late 2003.
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