I-55 Stevenson Expressway Reconstruction

CTE was responsible for construction management of the two-year, $200 million reconstruction of the Stevenson Expressway (I-55) west of downtown Chicago. CTE focused on the 1.7-mile easternmost section of the project, including reconstructing the high-volume I-90/I-94 interchange, eight bridges, five new retaining walls, removing and reconstructing all concrete pavement, new signage and lighting, a new traffic surveillance system, and concrete noise abatement walls. The project included environmental oversight since most of the soils were classified as special waste. Since this is one of four major freeways leading into Chicago and the project affected 138,000 vehicles each day, there were significant incentive and disincentive provisions for the contractor. The general contractor could have received $16,000 a day for finishing up to 30 days ahead of schedule, and if the three easternmost sections were completed early and traffic was restored to the original configuration, the incentives would have doubled for each contractor. Because of this, CTE staffed the project to respond quickly to changing schedules and demands as the contractors accelerated their work to capture these incentives. In addition, the entire construction had the historic theme of the Illinois and Michigan Canal corridor since portions of the Expressway were built on filled sections of the canal. Retaining walls and noise abatement walls were built with a limestone facade in the concrete.  Reusable form liners were used to make the vertical wall facade mimic the limestone blocks of the original canal.