Another road in Jefferson Hills will have an extended closure as part of the construction of the Mon-Fayette Expressway.
Crews will close Payne Hill Road at Jefferson Boulevard in the borough for nearly seven weeks beginning Tuesday. During the closure, Trumbull Corp. will rebuild the intersection at Payne Hill and Jefferson through Oct. 31.
As a result, drivers will not be able to exit from Jefferson to Payne Hill and vice versa.
The posted detour will have motorists use Route 51, North Lewis Run Road and Route 885/Clairton Road to get around the work.
The work is part of the Pennsylvania Turnpike’s project to extend the Mon-Fayette Expressway from Route 51 in Jefferson Hills to Route 837 in Duquesne. Trumbull has the first two contracts for the project and currently is working on the second segment to build the highway from north of Coal Valley Road in Jefferson Hills to north of Camp Hollow Road near Curry Hollow Road in West Mifflin at a cost of $165.6 million.
The turnpike closed part of Miller Road last year as part of construction, and various parts of Route 51 have been closed or restricted periodically for Mon-Fayette construction.
The full southern portion of the toll road will be broken into seven construction contracts and could cost as much as $1.2 billion. The work is being done from south to north, and the first two sections are expected to be completed and opened in 2026 and the southern segment from Jefferson Hills to Duquesne completed by 2028.
The agency wants to extend the highway across the Monongahela River to the Parkway East in Monroeville, but it hasn’t authorized design of that segment yet because it isn’t sure it has the funds to build it. The agency is paying for this project with a portion of the state oil franchise tax, where collections are still recovering from reduced driving during the pandemic.
Ed covers transportation at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, but he's currently on strike. Email him at eblazina@unionprogress.com.