Alternate detours to consider around Pennsylvania Turnpike closure
The Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission wants you to travel 80 miles out of your way to get around a bridge project in Beaver County that will close a portion of the highway from 9 p.m. Friday through 4 a.m. Monday.
But motorists aren't required to use the authorized detour route, which will follow Interstates 79, 80 and 376 and take motorists as far north as Mercer County. And plenty of shorter options are available.
“Certainly there are closer alternates,” turnpike spokesman Carl DeFebo said.
The turnpike will be closed to most motorists between the New Castle exit in Beaver County at mile marker 10 and the Cranberry exit in Butler County at mile marker 28. Local motorists headed east will be able to travel one exit past the New Castle exit to the Beaver Valley exit near Beaver Falls.
“This is a stretch of highway that carries 40,000 vehicles a day. To ensure the safety of those vehicles and to protect local roadways, we worked closely with PennDOT to come up with the best way to accommodate all the vehicles,” DeFebo said. “Especially for tractor-trailers, we can't be sending hordes of vehicles through small towns and along local, two-lane roads. We wanted to select a route that went interstate-to-interstate.”
The Turnpike Commission chose to avoid one interstate that would have made for a much shorter detour: I-376.
Westbound turnpike motorists could jump on I-376 at the Pittsburgh exit in Monroeville at mile marker 57 and then travel nearly 60 miles west to I-376's Pennsylvania Turnpike/PA-351 exit at mile marker 26 and continue heading west on the turnpike.
Likewise, eastbound motorists could get on I-376 at the New Castle exit and travel east the same distance to the turnpike exit in Monroeville and continue heading east on the turnpike.
Those routes would be slightly longer than the 47-mile trip between the turnpike's Pittsburgh and New Castle exits.
PennDOT spokesman Steve Cowan said there are several construction zones where traffic is reduced to a single lane along that stretch of I-376, including ones in Beaver County and near Pittsburgh International Airport in Allegheny County.
Motorists also would be subject to a toll near I-376's Chippewa exit in Beaver County, totaling 81 cents for motorists with E-ZPass and $1.45 for those without it. Motorists don't have to stop there to pay tolls — cameras photograph the license plates of non-E-ZPass motorists and the turnpike commission sends a bill for the toll by mail.
Other potential alternate routes include:
•Westbound turnpike motorists could travel between the turnpike's Cranberry and New Castle exits via Route 19, Freedom Road (which becomes Freedom Crider Road and then 9th Street in Beaver County), Route 65 north, Route 51 north and I-376 west. Directions would be opposite for eastbound turnpike motorists. This 34-mile detour includes the toll on I-376 and sections of Freedom Crider Road are narrow and winding.
•Westbound motorists could travel between the turnpike's Allegheny Valley and New Castle exits by taking Route 28 south into Pittsburgh and jumping on either I-376 west or Route 65 north to head toward the New Castle exit. I-376 goes all the way to the New Castle exit, while motorists choosing Route 65 would pick up Route 51 north and then I-376 west to get there. Directions would be opposite for eastbound motorists.
“There are definitely a lot of options, but many people traveling the turnpike are out-of-staters and probably aren't really familiar with local roadways, so they're probably better off following the suggested detour,” Cowan said.
