Safety is ‘top priority.’ Idaho 55 highway project delayed again as cost doubles
Already into its third year of construction, the overdue Idaho 55 highway project near Smiths Ferry has again been pushed back, now expected to extend into the fall.
Work on the lane-widening project restarted in May following the regular winter construction shutdown. The mile-long stretch is a main thoroughfare connecting Boise and McCall, and the road project had an original cost of $30.8 million.
After crews missed the project’s planned finish by fall 2022, the state’s transportation agency raised concerns late last year about possible avalanches as finishing touches carried over to another construction season. The highway project sits in a sensitive mountainous corridor along the Payette River and suffered from repeated rock slides during its first two years of construction, which required emergency closures of the roadway.
Of the six slides documented by the Idaho Transportation Department, only half were disclosed to the public at the time, an Idaho Statesman investigation previously revealed. The largest of the slides closed the road for almost three weeks. ITD officials have said they notified the public and closed the highway any time they were aware of risks to passing motorists.
The most problematic of the loose hillsides within the construction zone previously added about $14 million in costs to the overall project, ITD said. To ensure ongoing hillside stability, the agency now expects to spend up to another $10 million from a contingency fund to finalize the safety of the slope.
No avalanches or road closures occurred over the winter, and the project site remained stable during the work shutdown, ITD spokesperson John Tomlinson told the Statesman. To wrap up the project, erosion controls and snow fencing — a first in Idaho, he said — will be installed on the slope to prevent future rockfall and avalanches from spilling onto the roadway.
“We want to do the project the right way. We want to make sure we don’t leave anything unfinished,” Tomlinson said in a phone interview. “This is definitely going above and beyond, and something we’ve never done before. We want to make sure that the public is safe.”
A winter of heavy snowfall also delayed what was scheduled to be the restart of construction earlier this spring, he said. ITD previously set a revised summer 2023 completion schedule to add the finishing touches to the hillside.
That timeline is now delayed once more, and with escalating costs. ITD now estimates the cost of the project to reach as much as $61.6 million — double the original price tag. That total doesn’t include $1.8 million paid for the original project design and construction plans that later had to be amended.
“Most of the remaining work will have minimal impact on the traveling public along Idaho 55 and would likely consist of temporary shoulder or lane closures,” Tomlinson said. “Advanced notice will be given when traffic impacts are necessary.”
‘Worst day of my life’
Gov. Brad Little previously took aim at mounting costs and postponement to finishing the Idaho 55 highway project. In response to the latest delay, his spokesperson reiterated the governor’s concerns about the high-profile road project.
“Gov. Little is never pleased when projects encounter unforeseen delays and cost more money, but the safety of Idahoans is his top priority and the project must be done right,” spokesperson Madison Hardy told the Statesman by email.
For Rich Thometz, the rising price and delayed completion of the lane-widening project are unwelcome. But regardless, few others have the experience of the former Treasure Valley resident to understand the importance of the safety upgrades after decades, he said.
Thometz, 60, now in Clarksville, Maryland, was one of three Meridian High School students who went off an embankment of the narrow road in a car and into the river in the late 1970s. He was the only one of the three who survived.
“It was the worst day of my life, and still is to this day,” Thometz told the Statesman by phone. “And for me, obviously I have a personal, vested interest in those improvements being installed to prevent the run of accidents that have occurred for half a century.”
Through 2021, the 1-mile section of Idaho 55 had 154 crashes over two decades, ITD data showed. More than half of those accidents entailed injuries, and, most recently in July 2017, also included deaths, when a Garden City couple in their 70s went off the embankment in their SUV and into the river.
A 17-year-old Smiths Ferry girl also died in an April 1996 crash along the stretch when the pickup truck in which she was a passenger slid off the road and overturned in the river. The fatal wreck on Sept. 28, 1979, that included Thometz was another that raised more questions about the road’s safety.
Thometz and his two friends, Marc Heiland and Todd Johnson — all 16 years old at the time — played on the Meridian High football team and were celebrating a big win over crosstown rival Nampa High. They caravaned with other friends in the early morning hours following the game to cabins in Donnelly along Idaho 55, he said.
With Heiland driving, the car at one point left the roadway near Smiths Ferry. Thometz somehow escaped his friend’s Chevy Nova through the back window, either from being thrown or busting through the glass, he said. To this day and after years of nightmares, his memories are foggy from the incident, in which he sustained head injuries.
For decades, Thometz said he’d still remove his seat belt any time he drove over a body of water. But today, he’s grateful the safety enhancements have finally arrived at what transportation officials have labeled the “white-knuckle section” of Idaho 55, which he said he’s continued to track from the East Coast all these years later.
“It’s important to me because this kind of a road improvement project helps prevent fatalities that will otherwise occur on that section of Idaho 55,” Thometz said. “The benefits are very strong, notwithstanding the significantly increased cost that arose.”
Despite the extended wait, ITD officials are pleased to be nearing the end of the complex project, and making the safety improvements to the road some decades in the making — including an extra year of construction and millions in added costs.
“I feel like sometimes that gets lost in the story: Man, what a huge safety improvement this is,” Tomlinson said. “We have received so many positive comments and feedback about the safety aspect of it, of actually being able to pull a trailer in that area and not have to worry about going off the roadway. To be able to have wider shoulders — a shoulder at all — guardrails and to have wider lanes, we are so glad that we have this project, and that’s what we focus on, safety.”
This story was originally published July 20, 2023 at 10:16 AM.
