{"id":26849,"date":"2024-07-04T01:16:12","date_gmt":"2024-07-04T01:16:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/u-s-highway-550-realignment-opening-is-on-hold-until-further-notice\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T05:46:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T05:46:08","slug":"u-s-highway-550-realignment-opening-is-on-hold-until-further-notice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/u-s-highway-550-realignment-opening-is-on-hold-until-further-notice\/","title":{"rendered":"U.S. Highway 550 realignment opening is \u2018on hold until further notice\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Community
Community members and officials gather Thursday on top of the Gulch A bridge during a public preview and drive-thru of the U.S. Highway 550 realignment project. (Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Completion of the U.S. Highway 550 realignment with the Grandview Interchange has been \u201cplaced on hold until further notice,\u201d according to the Colorado Department of Transportation.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe traffic switch onto the new alignment is on hold until further notice,\u201d Adair Christensen, CDOT spokeswoman, said in an email to The Durango Herald<\/em> on Wednesday. \u201cWe will have an update after the Fourth of July Holiday.\u201d<\/p>\n

The realignment was dubbed the \u201cBridge to the Future\u201d by transportation officials at a May 9 \u201copen drive\u201d preview of the realignment<\/a> after years of Durango area residents referring to the connection as the \u201cBridge to Nowhere.\u201d<\/p>\n

The realignment, a $98.6 million project to bypass Farmington Hill south of Durango and connect with the Grandview Interchange, earned its unenthusiastic nickname from years of funding issues, property owner disputes and even Native American archaeological discoveries on Florida Mesa, all of which caused major delays to the project.<\/p>\n

At the time of the public \u201copen drive\u201d celebrating the project\u2019s near completion May 9, the traffic switch from Farmington Hill onto the new connection was planned to occur May 29.<\/p>\n

On May 23, CDOT announced it had hit another small snag. CDOT spokeswoman Lisa Schwantes said then the traffic switch would be delayed until possibly mid-June<\/a> because of lighting in the Grandview interchange roundabout awaiting completion.<\/p>\n

\u201cPer federal regulation, lighting is required at all roundabouts, and the project\u2019s electrical subcontractor was called away by FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency) to assist areas of Houston that had lost power after recent storms,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

No further explanations have been provided for the ongoing delay.<\/p>\n

cburney@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Completion of \u2018Bridge to the Future\u2019 in Grandview has no end in sight<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":26850,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[576,364,459,950,28,259],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-26849","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-colorado-department-of-transportation","tag-community","tag-construction-and-property","tag-durango","tag-headlines","tag-transportation"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26849","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26849"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26849\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":79494,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26849\/revisions\/79494"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26850"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26849"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26849"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26849"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=26849"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}