Mass Pike Reopens a Day Early; Comm Ave, BU Bridge Remain Closed

The state reopened all lanes on the Mass Pike Sunday, a day ahead of schedule. They’d been closed to accommodate work on the Comm Ave bridge. Photo by Jackie Ricciardi

Having thus far dodged “Commageddon,” enduring aggravating but not catastrophic driving delays as work continues on the Comm Ave bridge replacement, motorists on the Massachusetts Turnpike (I-90) had reason to celebrate Sunday morning: the highway fully reopened one day ahead of schedule.

Four of the Pike’s eight lanes had been closed to accommodate replacement of the westbound lane of the Commonwealth Avenue bridge, which runs over the Pike. While all eight lanes were up and running again as of 4 am Sunday, the ongoing bridge replacement work continues to shut the bridge and adjacent parts of Comm Ave. The BU Bridge also remains closed to all traffic except pedestrians and bicyclists.

There will be lane closures again on the Pike “during overnight, off-peak hours,” says Jonathan Gulliver, highway administrator with the Massachusetts Department of Transportation (MassDOT). He advises motorists to continue avoiding the area until the targeted completion of the overall bridge project at 5 am on Saturday, August 11. Workers are laboring around the clock to replace the aging Comm Ave span’s westbound lane, after last summer’s replacement of the eastbound side.

Traffic detours and other accommodations to help the public navigate the project can be found here.

The Pike reopening “is an important interim milestone for this major bridge replacement project,” Gulliver says. “We are pleased that our crews have been able to reopen the Mass Pike…and provide relief to commuters throughout the Boston regions for peak travel hours.”

Half of the lanes of the Pike, a major commuting route into the city, had been closed since July 27 to give workers room to demolish the westbound bridge lane overhead and ferry in 215 concrete deck panels and 45 steel beams for assembling. During the closures, many motorists heeded the state’s warnings to avoid the work area, and traffic volumes fell by as much as 40 percent, according to Gulliver.

But that wasn’t enough to avoid noticeable delays into and out of the city. Last Thursday, “There were times…where westbound travel was impacted by as much as an hour” of added drive time, Gulliver told a news conference last week.

Through August 10, the MBTA has added a weekday stop in Framingham for its 552 express train, which leaves Worcester at 8 am, for riders from west of Boston opting for mass transit rather than the Pike. The train will stop at Framingham Station at 8:29 am.

About 200,000-plus people travel daily over or under the bridge, when all modes of travel are counted.

The state timed the bridge replacement during summer’s slump in traffic. But “we realize the city doesn’t stop just for one project,” Gulliver said last week. “Like all projects, the reason we’re doing this one is not because we just want to disrupt the public; it’s because we have to.”

Bad weather could delay the work past its targeted reopening Saturday. “It’s obviously a steel structure. We’re using heavy cranes. That doesn’t mix well with lightning,” Gulliver says. “If we get into a lot of thunder and lightning storms, they will have to halt construction during those time periods for safety.”