Crews are ripping apart a lot of concrete for Project Neon. The bridge work alone involves more than 42,000 cubic yards of concrete to be exact.
That’s enough to build a sidewalk from Las Vegas all the way to St. George, Utah.
If you’ve ever wondered what happens to the layers of concrete they remove, they’re not throwing all it away, NDOT plans to use it on the highway.
The construction debris from Project Neon isn’t going to waste. In fact, the concrete will be given new life.
“We will take that material, we will screen it, pulling out the reinforcing steel or rebar then it will be crushed and reused elsewhere on the project,” said Tony Illia, NDOT spokesperson.
That includes the chunks of concrete removed over the weekend from demolition of I-15 bridges. The project is 60-percent complete, and as detours come and go, Daniel Brown hears all about them.
“I had to give somebody directions,” Brown said.
As a security guard at a gas station, just off the highway, he says, drivers are not shy when talking about traffic.
“I lived in California for a long time, southern Cal so this is actually kind of cute.”
Driver Derrick Powell hates it.
“I hate it a lot,” he said.
Some signs are confusing, and the back-up just downright annoying, he said.
“When you’re doing the Uber, driving the routes that they give you, they don’t normally go away from the construction,” Powell said.
Next time you drive up a ramp and deal with the detours, NDOT says remember this — once it’s all completed, in the summer of next year, it’ll improve this corridor’s commute by an estimated 30-percent.
