KWCH - Kansas News and Weather - Westbound Kellogg Opens Under Rock Road

Westbound Kellogg Opens Under Rock Road

Friday Update:  Westbound Kellogg traffic is now open under the new Rock Road overpass in east Wichita.  The lanes were opened to traffic Friday morning.

This is phase two of the reopening project.

The next phase is next week when all north-south through lanes and all turn movements for Rock Road traffic will be opened.

There'll be an easier path from now on for 80,000 drivers a day in east Wichita.  On Wednesday morning, construction crews began opening eastbound lanes at Kellogg and Rock Road.

Wichita Police and construction crews were on hand to make sure the two eastbound lanes opened smoothly.  Despite the change, construction supervisors said there were no accidents or wrecks as of the end of the afternoon rush hour.

Michael Jacobs, special projects engineer for the City of Wichita, says he understands the frustration over heavy construction the last two years at one of the city's busiest intersections.  Still, he says the construction was necessary.

Jacobs pointed to some of the first drivers to go under Rock Road as evidence.  Many were honking or waving at construction crews.

"Before we started, it took about 10 minutes to get through the Rock and Armour area," says Jacobs, "and what they're going to find is it's going to be less than two minutes."

Only two eastbound lanes of Kellogg were opened on Wednesday.  Westbound lanes will open on Friday, and the through and turn lanes of Rock Road will open next week.

Since 1985, Jacobs says Wichita has spent $500 million on turning the Kellogg corridor into a freeway.  The city's goal is still to expand the freeway to Goddard on the west side of Wichita and the Butler County line on the east side.  You can read details on these projects below through the live updates Eyewitness News provided throughout the day Wednesday.

Update - 3:30 p.m.:

The first phase of re-opening Kellogg and Rock Road is now complete.  Traffic is flowing on Eastbound Kellogg under the Rock Road overpass. 

The other phases will happen on Friday and the coming weeks.

Eyewitness News Reporter Cliff Judy is following the Kellogg & Rock intersection reopening. 

He asked Special Projects Engineer for the City of Wichita, Michael Jacobs, about what's next for Kellogg.

"The next thing that you're going to actually see is out on the west side of Wichita, we're going to build a couple of miles of frontage road," Jacobs said, "There's one that's been built from 119th to 135th.  That's what we're going to do out there to preserve the corridor, open up that area for developments so people can have better access.  Then, we'll come back and probably do the Webb interchange.  After that, probably the Greenwich interchange.  Then, we're getting out into the future.  What's going to be next?  I don't know.  That's quite a ways out."

Jacobs said the city will have Kellogg and Webb plans written up and ready to go by 2012.  It's the funding that's the problem because the city pays for the vast majority of the project.  Jacobs says the more realistic time frame when Kellogg and Webb construction will start is 2016.  He says if some other funding source or partner came into the picture, that would speed up the process.

By Jennifer Searle (WICHITA, Kan.)

The intersection of Kellogg and Rock will get a little easier to travel through this week. The city says it will start opening it to traffic in the following order:

Wednesday: Eastbound traffic will be routed onto the freeway after the morning rush.

Friday: Westbound traffic will be shifted onto the freeway beginning at Cypress after the morning rush. 

Next week:  All north-south through lanes and all turn movements for Rock Road traffic will be opened.

Week of November 16: Through lanes and turn movements for Armour/Towne East Mall Drive will open.

The construction project won't be complete. You'll probably see construction cones until spring 2010.

The city may not be done with Kellogg after the completion of Kellogg and Rock. Wichita and Andover are coming up with designs to freeway east through Andover.