COLUMBUS — Drivers crossing downtown Columbus late Sunday will need one more detour: Interstate 70 between Interstate 71 and State Route 315 closes again at 10 p.m. Sunday for the final night of a three-night run of overnight closures, reopening after 5 a.m. Monday, according to the Ohio Department of Transportation.
ODOT announced the closures on Oct. 15, initially describing a weekend closure before a spokesperson corrected the plan: the highway is closing only overnight, not around the clock. The same stretch closed at 10 p.m. on Friday and Saturday nights as well, reopening each following morning after 5 a.m.
For drivers who cannot avoid the corridor overnight, ODOT’s recommended detour uses only state routes: I-70 westbound to I-71 northbound to Interstate 670 westbound and back to I-70 westbound. Drivers heading through downtown in the late evening should expect added time, especially with Sunday’s Columbus Marathon crowds and road restrictions still clearing out of the downtown area earlier in the day.
Ramp closures tied to the work last a little longer. The Mound Street ramp to I-70 westbound, the Mound Street ramp to I-71 southbound and the I-70 westbound ramp to Rich Street and Town Street have been closed since 7 p.m. Friday and are scheduled to reopen by 5 a.m. Monday, Oct. 19. State Route 315 southbound at I-70 also closed overnight Friday into Saturday as part of the weekend work.
The closures are part of ODOT’s Downtown Ramp Up project, a $1.4 billion effort to rebuild and revamp the tangle of highways around downtown Columbus. The multi-year program is remaking the I-70/I-71 corridor, one of the most heavily traveled and crash-prone stretches of freeway in Ohio, with new ramps, bridges and lane configurations phased in over several construction seasons.
The overnight timing is deliberate: closing the freeway at 10 p.m. and reopening it before the Monday morning commute keeps the work out of the way of most weekday traffic. Even so, the weekend stacked the closures against some of the busiest events on the fall calendar, including Saturday night’s Twenty One Pilots concert at Ohio Stadium and Sunday morning’s Columbus Marathon.
Once the ramps reopen Monday morning, downtown freeway access returns to normal for the work week — though drivers should expect the Ramp Up project to bring further overnight and weekend closures as construction continues. ODOT advises checking its real-time traffic information before late-night trips through downtown while the project is underway.