This weekend – taking advantage of fall break at the University of Tennessee and no home Vol football game – crews will be rebuilding the intersection of Cumberland Avenue at 22nd Street.
Between 12:01 a.m. Friday, Oct. 7, and 5 p.m. Monday, Oct. 10, traffic will periodically be shifted on Cumberland Avenue, but one eastbound and one westbound lane will remain open.
One lane of southbound North 22nd Street will be maintained to accommodate Knoxville Area Transit bus operations and motorists leaving East Tennessee Children’s Hospital, but turns from Cumberland Avenue onto North 22nd Street will be prohibited during the four-day project.
Last week, the first phase of the intersection rebuild was completed. Crews excavated the southbound right-turn lane of 22nd Street between Cumberland and the alley just north of Cumberland. They also installed curbs and sidewalks at the northwest corner of the intersection.
The new intersection is part of the City’s $17 million reconstruction of the seven-block main stretch of Cumberland Avenue, to be finished by August 2017. Utilities have been upgraded from Alcoa Highway to 17th Street, and the existing four-lane Cumberland between 22nd and 17th streets is being reconfigured to a three-lane cross section with a raised median and left-turn lanes at intersections.
An earlier phase of work on the western end of Cumberland focused on improving traffic flow between the Alcoa Highway ramps and 22nd Street. That phase finished at the end of 2015, on time and under budget.
More information is available at www.CumberlandConnect.com, on the Cumberland Connect Facebook page, facebook.com/CumberlandConnect, and on the Cumberland Connect phone app. Or text VFL to 313131 to get text messages on the most current traffic updates.
