The state Department of Transportation is taking an unusually quick approach to resurfacing bridges along Interstate 77, though the project will still require closures and detours.

Between March 10 and May 22 next year, 14 bridges along the interstate will be resurfaced from mile marker 0 to mile marker 5, going from highway’s interchange with Interstate 26 in Lexington County across the Congaree River and into Richland County.

The project will rehabilitate all of the bridges along that stretch — eight northbound and six southbound.

The work is set to be done in two phases, each lasting nine days and completing work on all the bridges going in one direction. There will be a break of at least a week between each phase. Exact schedules for when each phase will begin will be set at a later date.

“The decks ... are going to be removed and resurfaced in a matter of a few hundred hours as opposed to conventional methods of taking several hundred days,” Tony Magwood, DOT’s resident maintenance engineer for Richland County and the project coordinator for the I-77 bridge resurfacing, said during a media briefing about the project.

He explained that DOT will be able to accomplish these quick turnarounds by closing the interstate in each direction for nine days, directing interstate traffic to follow Interstates 26 and 20 around Columbia during the closures.

Pete Poore, DOT’s director of communications, said another factor that will allow the work to be completed within the two nine-day windows is that crews will work on all the bridges in each direction simultaneously.

“Over the past five years, we have done significant maintenance along those bridges, both in Richland and Lexington counties, and we continue to perform maintenance,” Magwood said. “However, we've seen that just those small fixes are not going to get the job done. That's why a larger fix was put into place.”

Poore clarified that if this work is left undone, the roadway on the bridges will eventually crumble.

Among the reasons Magwood cited as pushing DOT to do this work and do it quickly is the large amount of commercial traffic hitting this stretch from Bluff Road and the Saxe Gothe Industrial Park, which includes Nephron Pharmaceuticals and the Amazon Fulfillment Center in West Columbia.

“[This approach] will allow us to move in, execute the project and allow the business community and the commerce along this section to go back to normal very quickly,” Magwood said.

The time frame selected for the project was influenced by several factors, including the weather required for the latex overlay to resurface the bridges.

“You can't do it during the winter months because of concrete, the crystallization in the chemical process, and during the summer months you have the evaporation in that process,” Magwood said. “That portion in the spring seems to be the sweet spot.”

The 67-day window allowed for the project also has to do with weather, as rain or unexpected temperature shifts could force delays or changes in the schedule.

Another key factor affecting the timing is the progress of the Carolina Crossroads project to re-do the combined interchanges of Interstate 126, I-26 and I-20 (commonly referred to as “Malfunction Junction”), as traffic will be redirected through this area during the closures along I-77.

“The Carolina Crossroads project, we work with that staff to make sure ... this time period doesn't have any conflicts,” Magwood said. “There will not be any lane closures in that area during the peak travel periods that are going to affect the traffic that will be moving to those areas.”

DOT will hold a public meeting Nov. 15 at the Cayce Tennis and Fitness Center at Otarre Pointe (1120 Fort Congaree Trail) for people to learn about the project and provide written comments.

“The meeting will have a drop-in type format with displays for viewing,” according to a press release.