The Missouri Highway and Transportation Department plans to widen the Route K bridge over Interstate 55 next year to accommodate growing traffic.

Freeman McCullah, district highway engineer in Sikeston, said the bridge will be widened from four to seven lanes with shoulders. When completed, the bridge will have four through-lanes -- two each way -- and three left-turn lanes, he said.

"The doggone thing will be about as wide as it is long," he said. "We will have to extend those piers that are there now."

The $3 million project will improve Route K from Siemers Drive to east of Farrar Drive. Construction could start as early as April and be completed by late fall, McCullah said.

The bridge will remain open to traffic during construction, but motorists can expect some delays, he said.

"It is a pretty good-sized job," said McCullah.

Two left-turn lanes will be added for westbound motorists seeking to turn south onto I-55 on the west side of the bridge.

There will be a single left-turn lane on the east side of the bridge for motorists seeking to turn north onto I-55.

McCullah said there are only four lanes on the bridge, with the two center lanes allowing motorists to either go straight or turn left. But the lack of specific left-turn lanes "causes quite a bit of confusion" and traffic congestion, he said.

As part of the project, the exit ramp off of the northbound lanes of I-55 at Route K will be improved. "We will widen that ramp and provide a right turn and two left turns," he said.

An asphalt shoulder serves as a makeshift right-turn lane, he said.

The exit ramp off the southbound lane also will be widened. "The ramp will have a right-turn lane and two left-turn lanes."

The lack of a left-turn lane in front of the Holiday Inn also is a traffic problem. But McCullah said highway crews just completed restriping the lanes to create a left-turn lane.

"We took a little bit off the shoulders and a little bit off the lanes, made them a little narrower. It's working pretty good," he said.

"We now have a left-turn lane continuously all the way from Farrar up to Mount Auburn." But, he said, "That's just a temporary measure to handle the increased traffic."

McCullah said traffic signals will be installed at Siemers Drive, which provides an entrance into Wal-Mart, and signals will be replaced on the west side of I-55 at Route K.

Signals will be added on the east side of the highway at the two ramps on either side of Route K or at Farrar Drive, or both, he said.

"From Wal-Mart down to Silver Springs Road, those traffic signals will be interconnected and function as one unit to provide a better flow of traffic through there," explained McCullah.

Commercial development in the area of Route K and I-55 has grown dramatically. McCullah said traffic's increased with the opening of the Red Lobster and Cracker Barrel restaurants.

Now, with the opening of the new Drury motel just west of I-55 and the planned construction of another motel and two restaurants at Mount Auburn Road and Route K, the traffic will increase even more, he said.

McCullah said some of the congestion should ease when the new Mississippi River bridge route is completed. There will be an interchange connecting the bridge route to I-55 south of Bloomfield Road.

"The new interchange will have intersections with Mount Auburn on the east side and Siemers on the west," he said. Motorists coming from the south could then exit at that interchange, rather than have to exit farther north at Route K.

McCullah said he wished the south interchange already was built because it would have made it easier to proceed with the Route K work.

"We certainly would have liked to have had the south interchange in by now," he said, "but we can't wait the three or four years that it will take."