I-380 interchange project receives $57M boost from feds

DES MOINES — Reconstruction of the Interstate 380 interchange with Wright Brothers Boulevard in Cedar Rapids will be fully funded after the project this week received a boost of $57.3 million in federal infrastructure funding.

The projected $112 million project calls for widening the interstate to six lanes from the north ramps of the Swisher interchange to just south of U.S. Highway 30. And it would reconfigure the Wright Brothers Boulevard interchange — the main exit to The Eastern Iowa Airport and a rapidly growing area fueled by a boom in manufacturing, warehouses and homes.

Bids will be considered mid-2024, construction could begin as soon as late summer 2024 and the project is slated to be completed in 2027.

With the new federal funding added to other federal, state and city contributions, the project will be fully funded, an Iowa Department of Transportation official said.

Cedar Rapids City Manager Jeff Pomeranz said the project will benefit citizens and anyone with business or housing interests on the I-380 corridor.

“This last piece, the funding of over $57 million, is absolutely critical and impressive that we’re able to pull the dollars together so quickly,” Pomeranz said. “This collaboration of federal and state government, with the city’s support, to accelerate work on the interchange will help resolve logjams there in an area seeing major growth.”

The state Transportation Commission approved the I-380 project as part of its five-year program in June 2022, and the Iowa DOT held public hearings on the project last winter.

“The city plans for industrial and commercial growth around the airport, and we wanted to get ahead of that growth,” Catherine Cutler, transportation planner in the Iowa DOT’s District 6 Office in Cedar Rapids, told The Gazette earlier this year.

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The project would include a “diverging diamond” interchange at Wright Brothers Boulevard — similar to but wider than the one just opened at Tower Terrace Road and I-380 — and add an additional lane on I-380 in both directions.

The interchange is designed to decrease vehicle “conflict points” and increase efficiency as left-turning traffic would no longer cross opposing traffic lanes under the “diverging diamond” concept.

The Iowa DOT also has budgeted another $28 million for adjacent work in the city, including improvements at the Sixth Street SW and Earhart Lane intersections, paving at the southbound interstate rest area and contingency costs.

Iowa Republican U.S. Sen. Chuck Grassley highlighted the new federal funding for the project in a news release Friday. Grassley was the only member of Iowa’s Congressional delegation to vote in favor of the federal infrastructure bill, which was signed into law in 2021 by Democratic President Joe Biden.

“I was glad to support the Iowa Department of Transportation’s grant application and the infrastructure bill that made this project possible,” Grassley said in a statement. “This investment will help increase productivity and safety for truckers, drivers and pedestrians. Our Iowa economy and local communities will greatly benefit as a result.”

Marissa Payne and Tom Barton of The Gazette contributed to this report.

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