Newswatch 16’s Jack Culkin shows us what the multi-million dollar project will mean for drivers.

DUNMORE, Pa. — Spend any amount of time looking over the Interstate 81/84 interchange in Dunmore, and you’re bound to see hundreds, even thousands, of cars and trucks whiz by.

It is that amount of traffic that has workers with Pennsylvania’s Department of Transportation District 4 office ready to rip out, repair, and restore miles of the vital highways.

“We’re doing a pavement reconstruction where we’ll be taking out the old pavement, replacing it, and we’ll be doing some restoration along the way. And this is due to some failures within the concrete, ” says Jessica Ruddy of PennDOT District 4.

Jessica Ruddy is the Community Relations Coordinator for PennDOT District 4. She says an all-lane pavement replacement will start on Interstate 81 around the President Biden Expressway in Scranton and stretch roughly two miles past the Route 6 interchange onto I-84.

Concrete pavement restoration will run from the interchange towards the Olyphant Avenue overpass near the Scranton Throop border.

“For this project, we do intend to maintain two lanes of traffic at all times, with the exception of the ramp work. The ramp work will be shutting down the ramps from the Dunmore and Troop exit, the Drinker Street exit, and the Casey Highway leading to Interstate 84. So there will be some closures along the way, and we will announce them,” says Ruddy. 

The $124 million price tag for the Interstate 81 and 84 project surpasses the recently completed twin bridges replacement, making it the second most expensive project in District 4 history, behind the building of the Casey Highway.

“Maintaining our interstates is our number one priority. We want to make sure that drivers are safe out there on our roadways. So we’re maintaining it ahead of time before it gets too bad,” says Ruddy. 

As PennDOT crews prepare the roadways, construction is set to start on April 1st and run through 2031.