Growth leads way to wider U.S. 59
Major roadwork project through Fort Bend trying to fill need, but has drivers feeling pain
Headed north on U.S. 59 near Reading Road, Grady Mapes easily sums up why workers are widening miles of the freeway through Fort Bend County as part of one of the largest ongoing highway projects in the Houston area.
“You can see the development out here,” said Mapes, area engineer for the Texas Department of Transportation in Fort Bend and Waller counties. “Right here, Brazos Town Center drives a lot of this.”
The commercial area at FM 762 is just a portion of the development expected to greatly boost the need for the much wider highway in both directions. Drive southwest, and signs advertise new homes planned for the four consecutive freeway exits. More truck traffic, some of it coming from a nearby rail container terminal, also convinced state transportation officials to make this widening project a priority.
The ongoing work will make U.S. 59 at least three lanes in each direction to Wharton County and bring HOV lanes deeper into the suburbs. With a $420 million price tag, the ambitious project stretches more than 22 miles of the freeway, making it roughly 80 percent of all the TxDOT spending in Fort Bend and Waller counties.
“The need is today,” Fort Bend County Precinct 4 Commissioner James Patterson said this week. “The whole project, all the way to the county line, goes into the future (traffic demand).”
Construction, however, takes time, officials said, and despite seeing a lot of new pavement along U.S. 59, it will be months before drivers have an orange-cone-free freeway. Tentatively, new lanes could open in October 2017 at the earliest, though Mapes said utility and right-of-way is--
sues have slowed progress.
“If I can open the northern end, safely, I am going to do that,” Mapes said. “We just don’t know right now what that’s going to look like.”
Meanwhile, the freeway remains two lanes in both directions — albeit lanes narrowed making truck travel tricky and slowing traffic — though major detours are planned.
Brad Daugherty, 43, said so far his commute from south of Rosenberg to Katy for his job as an apartment complex manager hasn’t changed much.
“It’s slower, but it’s always been slow,” Daugherty said, noting the freeway improvements helped convince him the area was growing and a good investment.
Increased truck traffic
Patterson said not only are residential and commercial developments putting more cars and pickups on U.S. 59, but truck traffic also is increased. That’s one of the reasons state and local officials now are developing Interstate 69, which through the Houston area is replacing U.S. 59 by upgrading the highway to interstate standards. The current work is part of that process.
“I-69 is going to be carrying more and more truck traffic not only from Mexico but from the container terminals,” Patterson said, noting a rail container terminal southwest of Rosenberg is also seeing increased activity that’s putting more trucks on the road bound for Houston and beyond.
Four segments
The overall U.S. 59 highway project is broken into four segments. From Crabb River Road to FM 762, crews are expanding the freeway to four general use lanes in each direction, as well as extending the HOV lane in each direction along U.S. 59 to FM 762.
Southwest of FM 762, crews are widening the freeway to three lanes in each direction and adding frontage roads.
Williams Brothers Construction was awarded all four of the segments. Often, contractors who secure a major project can bid lower on nearby projects because they already have materials and crews in place. Williams Brothers also has nine of the 13 contracts related to the 38mile widening of U.S. 290.
Meanwhile, work is moving in fits and starts on U.S. 59. As drivers sit in traffic while workers fix a pothole in the northbound lanes, about a half-mile of the future southbound lanes sits ready for lane markings. But likely it will be months before any vehicles besides construction trucks traverse the lanes.
Changing configuration
Crews first have to prepare bridges for the new lane configuration, including swapping how Reading Road, Williams Way and FM 762 connect with the freeway. Reading and Williams now go over U.S. 59 via bridges.
“While it is a little painful during the construction, overall it is going to be a tremendous project,” said Randall Malik, Rosenberg’s director of economic development.