Nine Months to Go: Phase II of I-94/Portage Road Reconstruction Begins Sunday

Like every construction project in Michigan, it always seems to take too long. The Interstate 94 at Portage/Kilgore Road interchange is no different. But beginning this weekend we might begin to start to see the light at the end of the tunnel, so to speak.

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The mostly obvious sign of this to the average driver will be Michigan Department of Transportation crews, on Saturday, April 9th, beginning a move of traffic to the newly built eastbound lanes between Lovers Lane and Sprinkle Road. This will allow work to begin on the rebuild of the westbound lanes of I-94.

On the ground below, the highway work continues on the entire Portage and Kilgore Road interchange, which is going to become a single-point urban interchange (SPUI), similar to the ones at Interstate 94 and Westnedge Avenue, and US 131 and Stadium Drive. All this is costing $87 million dollars.

Watching a YouTube video posted by MDOT was actually more confusing than enlightening, in trying to figure out what happens to Kilgore Road as it crosses with I-94. But with all the crooked roads and street in the Kalamazoo area, it really isn't all the surprising. The thought occurred as to the idea of why wasn't all this thought out in the late 1950's when the original I-94 was being built across Michigan, linking Chicago and Detroit and taking Red Arrow Highway and to a less extent US 12 out of the main flow of heavy traffic.

While the original plan was for the project to be done by mid November, now it looks like it will wrap up sometime closer to the end of the year, in December (December 20th is the projected end date).