When State Rep Al Pscholka of Stevensville announced last summer that U.S. 31 would finally be connected to Interstate 94 near Benton Harbor there were cheers and sneers. Hundreds of people cheered the news that the Michigan Department of Transportation was finally earmarking money to get the St. Joseph Valley Parkway, or (as it is more commonly referred to) the Bypass, completed after decades with no concrete plan. Dozens more sneered the standard, "Yeah, right, I'll believe that when I drive on it!" Today, though, the Stevensville Republican lawmaker said simply, "It's official."
Now, more than four months after his first take on the issue, Pscholka announced from Lansing today that construction of the final phase of the U.S. 31 corridor project will officially begin between 2017 and 2021 as earmarked in the latest 5-year plan from MDOT.
Pscholka was the first to break the news the day after the 4th of July when MDOT announced a $1.5 million appropriation to complete the long-awaited and often-delayed right-of-way work to connect U.S. 31 to Interstate 94.
Pscholka said then and reiterated today, “I don’t think there’s a day that’s gone by in the last six years when someone didn’t ask me when this corridor project would begin.” He adds today, however, “We now have a definitive window from MDOT as to when this will take place. In July we announced US 31 was back on the build list, and the big question was when? With these projects in a five-year plan, we now have the answer. This is another step forward. It won’t happen overnight, but it will be done.”
The U.S. 31 bypass started in Indiana in the 1950s, with construction moving into Michigan in the late 1970s. Rep. Pscholka said all of the environmental issues have been resolved. He said the total cost for all phases of the project is $92 million. Pscholka is chair of the House Appropriations Committee and serving in his final year in the Michigan House due to term limits.
He said today, “This reality was achieved by breaking the work into three phases – resurrecting 10 miles of I-94, replacing the interchange at downtown Benton Harbor to go east and west at Exit 33, and then connecting 31 to 94. Some people said it would never happen, but folks, it’s happening.”
The photo accompanying this story on Moody on the Market.com is purely for illustration purposes and is not an aerial photo of the actual road section involved in the completion project.
