Highway 96 bridge work disrupts Route 66 traffic to Carthage

Unexpected work on a bridge on Highway 96 (aka Route 66) east of Carthage, Missouri, has disputed traffic into that city.

The Missouri Department of Transportation began work on the bridge in mid-August. The agency is detouring large-vehicle traffic to Interstate 44, which disrupts Route 66 travelers. The bridge work won’t be finished until November.

Ron Hart of the Route 66 Chamber of Commerce recommends that westbound travelers in regular-size vehicles on Highway 96 west of Springfield take Highway 39 to Miller, Missouri, turn left on Fifth Street/County Road 2040 and turn left on Route UU, which returns travelers back to Highway 96.

Here’s a map of the detour for Route 66 travelers that Hart created.

Hart wrote in an email:

It appears this was a planned bridge replacement that was in Lawrence County, so MoDOT did not notify the surrounding counties and had to find out the hard way.  This even caught the ‘locals’ by surprise … some of whom have moved some barricades that impeded access to their homes and businesses. One man was so angry, he threw a barricade into a ditch! This is all happening on a closed portion of the highway that runs 1.5 miles between the west detour on State Road 97 to the actual bridge work in East Phelps.  There are two more  ‘open’ barricades in that gap with signs station that the road is open to ‘Local Traffic Only’. […]

I took the map to Barb at Turner’s (Gay Parita) Station last Sunday. When I arrived there was a huge motorcycle about to leave for Carthage, along with other 66 travelers going west. As soon as I got out of my car, I showed them how to avoid the 25-mile-long detour, and some took photos of the map. Barb said this was needed, as she did not know much about the MODOT detour. […]

Communities on either side of the detour have told me that there was a dramatic drop in Route 66 traffic and did not know about the detour. Carthage has the Military Convoy stopping at the Square on the 24th of Sept., followed by the big week-long Maple Leaf Festival a few weeks later.

As you know, September and October are popular travel months for those who want cooler weather, and this detour and our short bypass need to be promoted. MoDOT was pressured by Carthage to promote a signed Route 66 bypass last Spring when the RR bridge was replaced, but it is not likely they will do the same in Lawrence County unless pressure from our state representatives intercede, but that would have happened if we had known about this earlier.

This is the third time in recent years bridge construction has messed up Route 66 traffic going into Carthage. It seems MoDOT needs to be more sensitive to such traffic and how road projects can hurt tourism-related businesses if the detours aren’t signed properly.

(Image of the Route 66 / Missouri 96 detour via Ron Hart)

2 thoughts on “Highway 96 bridge work disrupts Route 66 traffic to Carthage

  1. “It seems MoDOT needs to be more sensitive to such traffic and how road projects can hurt tourism-related businesses if the detours aren’t signed properly.”

    A lesson you would have thought they would have learned by now. Disappointing.

  2. This reminds me of deviation signs in the UK. You get to a junction, and there is no sign to say which way to turn to continue on the deviation. Here it is one authority not thinking outside its own territory.

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