Single-lane restrictions are planned this week in both directions on a stretch of Interstate 70 in Rostraver and South Huntingdon.

Daily restrictions will be in place between 9 a.m. and 3 p.m. for at least two days — beginning on Wednesday, if weather permits.

The lane closures will affect traffic between the Route 51 and Smithton exits of I-70.

They will allow crews from Geronimo Painting to work on rehabilitation of the Matthew Smelser Memorial Bridge, which carries the interstate across the Youghiogheny River. The bridge is named for a paramedic supervisor from Washington County who was struck and killed by a tractor-trailer in January 2020 when he got out of a Rostraver-West Newton Emergency Services ambulance to tend to a crash victim on I-70 in South Huntingdon.

Depending on conditions, work on the bridge could be shifted into the early part of next week, PennDOT said.

The bridge rehabilitation is part of a $120.6 million project to update and reconfigure the Route 51 exit. That project also includes reconstructing sections of Route 51 and of the interstate, relocating the entrance of nearby Finley Road and replacing or rehabilitating seven other bridges.

Overall work on the project is expected to wrap up by fall 2027.

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