This aerial photo from Sept. 5 shows the interchange of Iowa Street and the west leg of the South Lawrence Trafficway. The east leg is still under construction but on track for completion in fall of 2016. The bridge that will connect the east and west legs of the SLT at this interchange is already complete.

The east leg of the South Lawrence Trafficway is still on schedule for completion in fall 2016, according to Kim Qualls, a spokeswoman for the Kansas Department of Transportation northeast district.

Much of the mainline lane paving is done, Qualls said, but all the shoulder and ramp paving remains.

The east end of the SLT, which will be the interchange at Kansas Highway 10, still needs a lot of work. However, the west end — or the Iowa Street interchange, where the west leg of the SLT currently ends — won’t be as complicated.

This aerial photo from Sept. 5 shows the interchange of Iowa Street and the west leg of the South Lawrence Trafficway. The east leg is still under construction but on track for completion in fall of 2016. The bridge that will connect the east and west legs of the SLT at this interchange is already complete.

“It’s not quite as simple as (this), but there’s already a bridge in place and we just add the ramps,” Qualls said.

Since May, K-10 has been reduced to one lane in both directions from East 1650 Road to East 1900 Road so workers can construct the east interchange with the SLT. Qualls said as of now, that portion of the highway is still planned to have both closed lanes reopen this December.

Noise walls on the north side of the portion of the SLT near the Baker Wetlands are built, and work continues on noise walls on the south side, Qualls said. In addition, 16 of 21 bridges for the SLT are complete.

In the city

The proximity of the SLT to city streets has been a challenge for construction workers as well as Lawrence residents.

“It’s much harder when you rebuild something already in the middle of a city,” Qualls said. “There’s a lot of adjacent streets right there.”

Louisiana Street south of 31st Street is on track to open later this month. The exact date, Qualls said, will depend on the weather.

This aerial photo from Sept. 5 shows the South Lawrence Trafficway looking west from where it meets Kansas Highway 10 east of Lawrence.

There will be further general work to do on a southern portion of the relocated Haskell Avenue, Qualls said.

“They’re going to do some work on Haskell, and I don’t know the portion, but it’s going to be in conjunction with the Douglas County Bridge Project, too, so that everything can just be closed at the same time as opposed to trying to close something two different times for people,” she said.

This has been a recurring pattern throughout construction.

“Everything is contingent on something else,” Qualls said. “We generally know when one thing opens that typically, depending what it is, we may end up closing something somewhere else to begin another phase.”

Rain, rain, go away

Weather can always cause problems for construction work, but Qualls said the heavy rain this summer has been one of the biggest challenges for the SLT project.

Last week, a bid was approved that will allow seeding and sodding for the 6 miles along the east leg of the SLT. Qualls said with typical projects, seeding and sodding waits until everything else is completed, but since the SLT is so big, workers are starting on some of it already.

This aerial photograph from Sept. 5 shows the interchange where the east leg of the South Lawrence Trafficway meets Haskell Avenue. This will be the only interchange on the east leg between its beginning, off Kansas Highway 10 east of Lawrence, to its western end at Iowa Street.

“There’s a lot of grass, a lot of seeding that’s going to have to be done along this stretch of K-10, so that also is going to be part of the work that’s ongoing,” Qualls said.

With any construction project, Qualls said, a lot of erosion control is necessary. That’s especially true when there are a lot of storms in the area, such as the ones Kansas saw last week.

“A lot of people don’t realize how much work just keeping on top of the erosion control is,” she said. “(…) Things so quickly can wash out, even with the best (erosion control) in place.”

On the western front

The Bob Billings Interchange has been projected to open in late November. However, Qualls said workers ran into a small problem that could potentially delay its opening by a couple of weeks, but she could not yet elaborate on details.

This aerial photo from Sept. 5 shows the interchange at Bob Billings Parkway and the west leg of the South Lawrence Trafficway. It has been projected to open in late November.

“We’re still hoping for late November,” she said. “The thing they’re working on might take an extra two to three weeks, but we just don’t know yet, so I’d really hate to say until we know.”

Over the weekend, North 1500 Road just east of the west leg of the SLT opened to George Williams Way. Access to East 902 Road from the SLT is now permanently closed. Qualls said the west side of North 1500 Road was projected to open later this month, but that may be pushed to October.

“With the work they’re trying to figure out, the resolution for what they ran into, we don’t think that road is going to open as soon as we thought we were hopefully going to try to open it,” Qualls said.

If Mother Nature cooperates, the SLT should remain on track, she said.

“We’re still doing really good as far as the schedule goes,” Qualls said. “Work will probably slow down a bit here in, say, November, December, and of course all the way into spring — just dependent on weather, essentially.”