Demolition of a bridge and preparations for constructing a new one will shut down several major ramps in the Mixing Bowl between 9:30 p.m. to 5 a.m. until Saturday, Virginia Department of Transportation officials said.
“The impact is for motorists heading from the Wilson Bridge on the Inner Loop [Interstate] 495 west and north to Tysons Corner and also motorists in that same direction from the Inner Loop to [exit] 169 that takes them to Springfield,” said Steve Titunik, VDOT’s Springfield Interchange spokesman.
About 700 vehicles per hour between 9:30 p.m. and midnight and up to 500 per hour between midnight and 5 a.m. will be detoured from the Inner Loop and its connecting ramps until Thursday.
The Inner Loop between exit 170B to after the I-395 overpass; the ramp from the Inner Loop to exit 169B/A Springfield/Franconia, Route 644; I-395 South to I-95 South; and HOV lanes will be completely closed with posted detour signs.
Northbound I-395 from Old Keene Mill Road to Edsall Road and ramps from Old Keene Mill Road to I-395 north will be closed from 9:30 p.m. to 5 a.m. on Thursday and from 9:30 p.m. Nov. 3 to 9 a.m. on Wednesday.
Some 800 vehicles per hour travel I-395 north between 9:30 p.m. and midnight and more than 600 per hour between midnight and 5 a.m.
“Local motorists and anybody in the Northern Virginia area know their way around. They don’t have to take our detour routes. …They have alternates there,” Titunik said.
“We’re hoping we won’t see multi-mile backups, but there will be an inconvenience especially in the first hour or two,” said Larry Cloyed, the interchange’s project manager.
Cloyed said similar closures will occur again in the spring when steel beams are lifted into place over the Beltway and another bridge is demolished.
Motorists can look forward to the opening of a new, two-lane ramp from the Outer Loop to I-95 South that eliminates the current merge-and-weave patterns with local traffic, Cloyed said. “It certainly helps to make it a safer interchange, which has always been our first priority there.”
The $676 million Springfield Interchange will be completed in July 2007.
