Highway 55 Construction West of Plymouth

If you haven't been going west on Highway 55 you may not have seen that the road is closed west of Medina to Rockford. The construction has been ongoing from about July 30 and is slated to be completed in September, according to MnDOT.

Highway 55 is closed between County Road 19 and County Road 101 for work on the east portion of the project. Detours include routes on County Road 19, County Road 50, County Road 10 and County Road 101.

For the past two weeks both directions of Hwy 55 have been fully closed to all traffic between Witchita Trail and Willow Drive and no access for local businesses or residents will be available on this portion of the roadway since sections of the road are being removed. This part of the work is supposed to be done in the next week.

The project's project is to restore pavement structure and improve ride quality. The work done now is to help improve safety for motorists and pedestrians.

The work on Hwy 55 includes resurfacing it between Ash Street in Rockford and just west of Pinto Drive in Medina, upgrading accessibility at intersections, replacing guardrails, adding rumble strips, repairing curb and gutters, working on drainage structure and adding turn lanes on several roads off the highway including turn lanes at Vernon Street, Sioux Trail, Nyles Court, Yvette Street, Lake Sarah Heights Drive, Townhall Drive, Town Line road, Pioneer Trail and rolling Hills Road.

According to the MnDOT web page on the project:

For access to a business or residence within the overall closure area (between CR 19 and CR 101) you are able to go as far east as Witchita Trail or as far west as Willow Drive, but will not be able to pass through the area of reconstruction.

Motorists who need to access a business/residence on the opposite side of the reconstruction area (for example, coming from Plymouth on Hwy 55 to access a residence on Witchita Trail) will need to use the posted detour route (CR 101, CR 10, CR 50 and CR 19) to access the destination from the other side. 

A special note by MnDOT indicates a bald eagle's nest on the north side of the highway and that construction crews will minimize their work around the nest area by not parking equipment or material near it, keeping away within 330 feet during the roadwork.

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