Highway 95 expansion delayed until spring

The long-awaited widening of U.S. Highway 95 from Thorncreek Road to Moscow will have to wait until the spring, Ken Helm, Idaho Transportation Department project manager, said.

“It’s going to happen,” Helm said. “I feel positive.”

Helm said ITD needs to finish purchasing right of way for the project, which was slated to start construction this year, and obtain a wetlands mitigation permit from the Army Corps of Engineers.

The project will replace about 6½ miles of the existing two-lane roadway with a new four-lane divided highway on Highway 95 south of Moscow. The project is expected to improve safety and highway capacity by widening shoulders, reducing curves, adding rumble strips and replacing guardrail.

The expansion would make all of Highway 95 between Moscow and Lewiston two lanes in each direction.

Helm said the new goal is to complete the $53 million project in 2022. The federal government will pay for the entire project except for a 7.34 percent match from the state.

He said the project is the highest priority in ITD’s District 2, which maintains 1,500 lane miles and 180 bridges in five north central Idaho counties.

Helm said there have been no fatalities on the dangerous 6½-mile stretch of Highway 95 for “quite a few years.”

“I want to get that thing done so we don’t have any (fatalities) in the future,” he said.

Legal challenges to the project ended in December 2018, when the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a lower court ruling in favor of ITD and the Federal Highway Administration.

The Palouse Ridge Defense Coalition submitted a lawsuit against the FHA and ITD regarding the project’s Environmental Impact Statement and Record of Decision in April 2017, which claimed the highway’s expansion would cut through a section of Paradise Ridge and lead to loss of wetlands, remnants of Palouse Prairie, farmland and conservation reserve.

A federal judge ruled against the motion and in favor of the FHA and ITD in August 2017, but the coalition appealed.

Helm said he does not anticipate another appeal or lawsuit.

The project is on the fiscal year 2021-27 draft Idaho Transportation Investment Program.

Other projects in Latah County in the draft plan include:

Constructing in 2021 a northbound passing lane south of the Highway 95 and State Highway 6 intersection near Potlatch

Constructing in 2022 right and left turn lanes on Highway 95 and the junction of 95 & Meckel Road south of the highways 95 and 6 intersection near Potlatch.

Constructing in 2024 an eastbound passing lane on State Highway 8 east of Moscow

Constructing in 2025 a northbound passing lane on Highway 95 north of the highways 95 and 6 intersection near Potlatch

Constructing in 2026 a north and southbound passing lane on Highway 95 between Freeze and Beplate roads north of Potlatch

Constructing in 2027 turn lanes on Highway 95 where it intersects with Foothill and Estes roads north of Moscow

Draft plan projects in Moscow are forecasted to happen on Mountain View Road, Sixth Street, Third Street, Public Avenue and the proposed pedestrian underpass near the south couplet.

A 2022 project in Genesee is expected to rehabilitate Chestnut Street from Jackson to Cedar streets.

Public comments on the draft plan will be accepted through the end of this month. Visit itd.idaho.gov/funding/?target=draft-itip for information on commenting.

Garrett Cabeza can be reached at (208) 883-4631, or by email to gcabeza@dnews.com.