A new travel lane on Interstate 66 East between the Dulles Connector Road and exit 71 (Glebe Road/Fairfax Drive) opened today as part of the I-66 Eastbound Widening project. The new lane addresses a bottleneck on I-66, east of the Capital Beltway, where eastbound traffic on the Dulles Connector Road merges into eastbound I-66, funneling down to two through-lanes. In addition to the new four miles of additional lane, ramp improvements have been completed at exits 69 (Washington Boulevard/Lee Highway) and 71 (Glebe Road/Fairfax Drive), as well as rehabilitation and repairs to bridges, and construction of more than 12,000 linear feet of new and replacement noise barriers along eastbound and westbound I-66.
“We are pleased to announce the completion of our widening effort on I-66 inside the Capital Beltway, an important part of a comprehensive set of multimodal improvements benefitting the I-66 corridor,” commented Virginia’s Secretary of Transportation Shannon Valentine. “Today’s milestone is the result of many partners working together to support a compromise that was reached by the General Assembly in 2016, enabling us to initiate the widening of a very constrained and often-congested section of the highway. The widened roadway, combined with peak-hour express lanes and multimodal improvements funded by express lanes toll revenues, are designed to work together to move more people through the I-66 corridor.