Iway

Iway
The rerouted I-195 in downtown Providence runs over the newly completed bridge at bottom, further away from the downtown core. The missing section of the old I-195, right of the Providence River, marks the beginning of the previous highway's demolition.
Carries	Motor vehicles
Crosses	Providence River
Locale	Providence, Rhode Island, US
Maintained by	RIDOT
Website	Federal Highway Administration
Characteristics
No. of lanes	8
History
Construction end	2010
Construction cost	US$610 million
Opened	2007

The Iway is the $610 million project by the Rhode Island Department of Transportation (RIDOT) to relocate the Interstate 195 and Interstate 95 intersection in Providence, Rhode Island. As of Spring 2013, all reconstruction and demolition is complete, and the last remaining project is to rebuild city streets around the deconstructed corridor.

The project freed up space in downtown Providence and the Jewelry District. It involved renovating India Point Park and constructing a 50-foot (15 m)-wide pedestrian bridge; building a signature arch bridge over the Providence River; and improved highway flow, access, and safety, as the existing intersection was not built for modern traffic standards. The previous lane alignment was dangerous and created congestion, as lane shifts were often required to avoid a left sided exit-only lane; moreover, the concrete supports deteriorated to the point that steel shoring are needed to reinforce the intersection's many bridges.

Back in the 1980s, RIDOT reviewed many plans to deal with the aging section of I-195 in Providence, which was built in the 1950s. Along with having to complete numerous repairs on one of the busiest stretches of highway in Rhode Island, traffic volumes had increased tremendously over the years. The highway designed for 75,000 vehicles a day now carries more than 160,000 cars daily.

The old design had other problems. Tight curves, left-hand exits and closely spaced exits have contributed to excessive congestion on the highway, which spills over onto adjacent highways, causing delays for motorists on I-95, the Route 6/10 connector, and on city streets.

As RIDOT worked on the Iway’s Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) in the early 1990s, the highway’s problems were put to paper. The EIS noted deteriorated bridges, substandard roadway alignments, sharp curves and substandard shoulder widths. During the initial stages of the project, DOT worked on a joint project between the School of Architecture at ETH Zürich, and the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD), Providence, Rhode Island to include studies of the Iway in their "Project Providence," an exploration of the city through computer visualization.