Drivers will see lane closures along East College Avenue (Route 26) and road closures where the highway intersects with Houserville Road and Pike Street in College Township starting next week, as PennDOT officials say workers will start reconstructing the bridge at the intersection.
Work begins on Monday, but the road closures and detours go into place on Tuesday. Drivers can access and leave Houserville using Puddintown Road instead, and there will be a temporary traffic signal at the Puddintown Road/College Avenue intersection to help with the increase in traffic.
Traffic to and from Lemont on Pike Street will be detoured to Elmwood Street.
These road closures will affect traffic to the nearby Spring Creek Elementary School, which has its last day of school on June 5. A PennDOT spokesperson said they have been communicating with school officials since October and that they signed off on the detours. The PennDOT spokesperson also said this start date was the best compromise between impacts on the State College Area School District and on Penn State once classes resume in the fall.
Also starting on Tuesday, PennDOT said workers will close the northbound lanes of College Avenue heading toward the Nittany Mall and move traffic into the southbound lanes with one lane going each direction. Drivers will be able to turn right onto Houserville using the existing turning lane.
PennDOT officials say they expect this traffic pattern to remain in place until mid-August, at which point workers will close the southbound lanes and shift traffic into the northbound lanes.
The bridge reconstruction work is expected to finish in early November, but PennDOT officials say that could change depending on the weather and "other unforeseen circumstances."
