St. George • The project to build two underpasses in St. George to bridge the divide created by Interstate 15 is being revived.
State transportation officials say they plan to proceed this fall with construction of the two underpasses at 400 East and 900 South as part of a $107 million project to widen I-15 along the 2.5-mile stretch from Bluff Street to St. George Boulevard.
This comes nearly six months after the Trump administration rescinded a federal grant that the Biden administration had awarded for construction of the crossings.
But that plan comes with a caveat: funding.
St. George and the state must find a way to recoup or offset the $87.6 million in federal funds that were axed in July as a result of the passage of President Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill Act.”
UDOT project manager Brett Anderson said his agency and the city are exploring funding options at the federal, state and local level to make that happen.
“We are asking for help because that is a lot of money we lost,” Anderson said.
One possible solution, which St. George officials are exploring with Sen. John Curtis’ office, is to get the federal government to restore all or part of the funds it stripped for the underpasses.
“But that ship has sailed and won’t happen this federal fiscal year,” said Shawn Guzman, St. George’s government affairs director. “We think there’s still a chance to get some of that federal funding restored next fiscal year.”
A spokesperson for the Curtis said that the office “is currently in discussions with the Department of Transportation and local leaders to secure the best possible outcome for St. George.”
Pursuing other options
In the meantime, UDOT has applied for a $25 million grant from the U.S. Department of Transportation, and UDOT officials said they hope to know if that is approved by this summer.
Another possibility, UDOT spokesperson Kevin Kitchen said, is for the state agency to move the project higher up the priority list and provide more funding or to redirect money saved on other projects that have been completed under budget to underpass construction.
“Even then, it is nowhere near what we would need,” Kitchen added. “It’s more like scraps on the table.”
Still other options including the city kicking in some money to make up the shortfall. Guzman said that could happen, but that it would be a difficult decision because the city is already involved funding the $100 million expansion of the St. George Regional Airport. He said the city is also trying to sell state legislators on allocating money to fill the gap in funding.
Guzman said it is not an easy sell. He explained that some legislators struggle to grasp that I-15’s construction through St. George in the 1970s created a rural freeway. At that time, the town’s homes and businesses were largely confined to one side of the road, with fields stretching out on the other.
Since then, St. George’s population has swelled to more than 100,000 and city officials say the freeway acts like a barrier because it has too few underpasses, impedes east-west traffic flows and separates neighborhoods and businesses on either side of the interstate.
St. George, Mayor Jimmie Hughes said, is not only bisected by the interstate, but also has geographic barriers, namely ridges on three sides that also act as major obstacles to efficient transportation.
“Losing that funding for those underpasses last year was a big blow,” Hughes said.
Bridging the I-15 divide
(Google Maps; The Salt Lake Tribune) A U.S. Department of Transportation grant will help fund the construction of two underpasses in St. George aimed at connecting neighborhoods now separated by Interstate 15. The new underpasses will be built at 400 East (Flood Street) and at 900 South.
If funding is secured, UDOT will raise the highway to add two new underpasses at 400 East (Flood Street) and 900 South, connecting currently separated neighborhoods. Currently, the only I-15 crossings are St. George Boulevard, 100 South, 700 South, and Bluff Street, which frequently experience congestion during peak hours.
City officials say the additional underpasses would reduce congestion and improve public safety at Dixie High and Dixie Middle schools. The crossings would enable students living in the neighborhood just east of the interstate to walk to Dixie High and Dixie Middle schools on the opposite side in five minutes instead of traveling a mile out of their way to cross the freeway at Bluff Street or 700 South.
In addition to the underpasses, the wider freeway is also expected to ease traffic congestion. Roughly 60,000 vehicles per day travel I-15 between the Bluff Street and St. George Boulevard exits, which is projected to increase to 94,500 vehicles by 2050, according to the Dixie Metropolitan Planning Organization.
“We are just trying to bring [the interstate] up to the point where it can serve the fifth-largest city in the state,” Guzman said.