The Colorado Department of Transportation’s $487 million U.S. 36 Express Lanes project earned the Grand Prize in the 2017 America’s Transportation Awards competition.A multimodal project in Colorado and the removal of dangerous intersections in Idaho won top honors at the 2017 America’s Transportation Awards competition.
The Colorado Department of Transportation’s $487 million U.S. 36 Express Lanes project earned the Grand Prize and the Idaho Transportation Department’s $11.2 million U.S. 20 Thornton Interchange project was voted the People’s Choice Award winner. The 10th annual competition was sponsored by the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO), AAA and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
CoDOT’s project between Denver and Boulder included the installation of intelligent transportation systems for incident management, tolling, transit and traveler information, along with the replacement or widening of 13 bridges, the addition of bus rapid transit lanes and a commuter bikeway.
The IDOT’s project in rural eastern Idaho was the last of seven new interchanges built in the past 17 years to provide safe access to and from a 34-mile stretch of U.S. 20.
The 2017 competition attracted a record 92 nominations from state transportation departments in 39 states and the District of Columbia, the AASHTO reports.
Four regional competitions were held, and the three projects from each region receiving the highest ratings competed for the final two awards. An independent panel of industry judges selected the Grand Prize winner, and the project receiving the highest number of online votes earned the People’s Choice Award.
The awards came with $10,000 cash prizes to be used to support a charity or transportation-related scholarship program.
For more about the contest and this year’s entries, go to americastransportationawards.org
