Southwest of Salt Lake City, the communities of Kearns, Taylorsville, West and South Jordan are home to around 250,000 people, making it a major population center in the Salt Lake Valley. The communities are also gateways to expected development farther west in Herriman and Eagle Mountain.
Other than growth, the thing these communities have in common is a heavy reliance on the Bangerter Highway. The roughly 25-mile-long, north-south road runs parallel to Interstate 15 to the east and stretches from Salt Lake International Airport on the north end to an intersection with I-15 on the south.
Adan Carrillo, a community relations spokesman for the Utah Dept. of Transportation, says studies on improving traffic flow on the highway had been under way since 2005.
Draper, Utah-based Ralph L. Wadsworth design-builders was awarded the $49-million contract and began work in early 2011. Work on the CFIs at 6200 and 7000 South was carried out almost simultaneously and was nearly complete before crews began moving earth and preparing to build the grade-separated structure at 7800 South.
