While traffic eased in the first year of the pandemic, drivers in Houston and Conroe still spent hours waiting in their cars.
Resident comments on the plan to connect and widen Old Conroe Road and Sgt. Ed Holcombe Boulevard are due May 5.
Officials planned the closure last weekend, but weather conditions were too wet and cold to lay concrete.
The evolution of a formerly four-lane boulevard into a tollway from Houston to Magnolia and beyond is expected to open at the end of 2019.
"Critics have made numerous false statements about this project and tried to suggest it would be a failure...," County Judge Craig Doyal