Hooray! New I-25 Express Lanes Now Partially Open

Phase 1 of Colorado's highly anticipated Express HOV lanes on north- and southbound Interstate 25 in the Northern Colorado area are nearly complete and are now partially open. Will this help with the extra holiday traffic?

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New I-25 Express HOV Lanes In Northern Colorado Now Partially Open

Driving up to the Colorado Eagles game at the Blue Arena in Loveland on Friday night, I noticed something that caught me by total surprise. While most I-25 drive surprises aren't good, this particular one made me incredibly happy.

The northbound HOV lanes just past Longmont weren't blocked off any longer and were finally open for business.

After more than five years of constant construction, some bright lights finally exist at the end of the HOV land construction tunnel.

The three-quarters of a billion-dollar I-25 construction project is starting to receive the finishing touches on a decent amount of the extremely busy interstate expansion. Sections, both north- and southbound just south of Longmont near Berthoud and south of Loveland near Johnstown have opened for drivers just in time to help relieve some of that insane holiday traffic.

While the entire 19-mile project isn't fully functional outside of the small stretch already open, it's expected to be completely open by mid-December. In an article from the Coloradoan, Jared Fiel, Colorado Department of Transportation's Northeast Region spokesperson, said:

(that mid-December is) the very latest, and we are hoping to get it open even sooner. That would give drivers an early holiday present and make it a whole lot easier to get to grandma's house

The project's final step is the overhead sign installation and repainting of the lines. Once those last couple of items are complete, we'll be free sailing. Well, free for now anyway.

Typically you need three or more people in your car to not be charged for rolling in the HOV but the toll fees will be waived until spring 2024 when both the tolling devices and the equipment that detects people weaving in and out of the toll/HOV lanes illegally will be activated.

The next step in I-25 construction will be to install the HOV lanes from Berthoud down to Highway 66 in Longmont so any signs of completion on that stretch are still a ways out. It'll be a huge deal once it's finally complete, though.