Highway 40 at Market/Compton Closures Coming Soon!

Highway 40 at Market/Compton Closures Coming Soon!

Amidst all the hubbub about "The New I-64" long-term detours, somehow there's been much less publicity about the upcoming separate closure of Market and Compton at Highway 40 to replace both overpasses.

Highway 40 itself will be closed beginning 7 p.m. Friday, June 2 and until 5 a.m. Monday, June 5. This will extend until 5 a.m. Monday, June 5. This is to allow for demolition (for now) of just the Compton Ave. bridge.

Alternate route:

* MODOT recommends I-70 or I-44.

Detour routes:

* Eastbound I-64 traffic will be detoured onto eastbound Bernard St. to eastbound Market Street to south Ewing Ave. to eastbound I-64.

* Westbound I-64 will be detoured at Forest Park Ave. to southbound Grand Blvd. to westbound I-64.

Compton Avenue crosstown traffic will need to detour via Grand or Jefferson for the next six months!

Likewise, according to the detailed Detour Map (PDF), Market Street at Compton, all its access ramps to Highway 40, as well as the ramps for accessing Forest Park Parkway and Grand Blvd. from westbound 40, will be closed at various times over the summer. Forest Park eastbound traffic will need to exit at Grand.

The eastbound 40 exit at Market St./Bernard St. may still be open, but only to access the area under the Grand Ave. viaduct via Bernard St. Spruce Street will be closed from the Metro bus maintenance facility east to Sigma-Aldrich, at least for a while. No access to/from Compton will be possible during that time. Presumably, then, Compton will be barricaded at Chouteau on the south, and (once Market is closed) Laclede on the north.

Recommended detour routes are via Grand to Lindell/Olive and then Jefferson or the 20th Street onramp to 40 (accessed via Pine Street just west of 20th); or via Chouteau from Grand to Jefferson.

Also, as a result of this detour the #52 Clayton-South County (PDF new route map), effective Monday, May 29th 2006 (Memorial Day) will be routed via Ewing instead of Compton through Midtown between Market and Olive. Similarly, the #92 Lindenwood (PDF new route map) will be terminated at the Metro bus maintenance facility off Spruce, operating bidirectionally instead of in a loop on the route already used by the #57 Manchester and #42 Sarah below the Grand viaduct on Scott Avenue. It will not serve SLU or Harris-Stowe at all during this construction period.

Laclede Ave. at one time would have been a natural limited detour route, and was once the route of the #52 Forest Park bus. ; but of course, east of Grand it pretty much no longer exists except as a parking lot access route for SLU and Harris-Stowe. For goodness sakes, the part next to the old Grand Forest Apartments just west of Compton is now covered in Astroturf!