Upcoming overnight closures on South Academy Boulevard near Colorado Springs follow weekend daytime closures
EL PASO COUNTY, Colo. (KRDO) — It's rare to have all lanes in one direction of a busy corridor closed all day for construction, but that's what drivers endured this weekend along the South Academy Boulevard widening project.
On Saturday and Sunday, the county closed the boulevard between Bradley Road and Highway 85/87 so that workers could perform welding on the Academy overpass without it being affected by vibrations from traffic.
KRDO13's The Road Warrior drove through the area Sunday and saw temporary backups between Milton E. Proby Parkway and the Bradley Road exit where traffic was detoured around the closure.
The county says that the project is nearly two-thirds completed and remains on schedule to be finished early next year.
"We have a lot of signal work that we still have to get done under I-25, that we haven't started too much on that yet," said Brett Hartzell, the project manager. "We still have some drain work around I-25, as well. We've got some widening to the east that we haven't got completed yet."
Overnights Tuesday through Thursday — with snow likely to change the schedule — the county plans to close all northbound lanes of Academy in the same area so that welding can continue.
To detour around the closures, traffic will exit at Highway 85/87, then take Main Street in Security-Widefield until it turns into Hancock Expressway, and finally take Bradley Road back to Academy.
A business that seems most affected by the project is the High Country Veterinary Clinic on the west end of Bradley Road near the Academy overpass.
The Road Warrior reported last May that the clinic has had continuing issues with trash, potholes, and poor drainage where Bradley dead-ends; the clinic staff has coped with flooding on the road, in the parking lot, and even in the building.
"Even though some of the closures don't, like, directly affect the roads that are getting to us, they're affecting the roads right around it , and then it creates a lot of traffic that causes a backlog at that roundabout that's over there," said Hannah Struif, the clinic's office manager. "And then, sometimes, it (causes) delays with our employees getting here, with our clients getting here. And sometimes, it makes a lot harder for clients to find us."
Struif said that the clinic finds it difficult to contact county officials to resolve the issues.
Hartzell responded to the concern.
"We've gotten various calls from them before," he said. "And if they call, we just try to help them out as much as we can."
Hartzell also revealed that crews have been doing more scouring work on the Academy bridge over Fountain Creek. He described the work as countermeasures to prevent more extensive repairs that were required early in the project from late 2023 to early 2024 and closed several lanes of traffic during that time.
