Interstate 64

From WikiLou

Interstate 64 opened in 1976 and serves communities east and southeast of St. Louis en route to Louisville, Kentucky. West of Interstate 57, the highway has seen an increase of ADT over the past twenty years, which has resulted in widening from Illinois Route 157 to Green Mount Road ^[1].

Originally, I-64 did not go into Missouri at all. The western terminus was at Interstates 55 and 70 in East St. Louis. In August 1987, however, it changed. During the 1980s, the trucking industry found a loophole in federal law and started ordering their fleet to take Highway 40 through St. Louis. Truck weight laws were more lenient on Highway 40 than on Interstate 70 during the time.

Despite the change, the locals and the media still refer to the Missouri section as Highway 40, and 55-70-64 is never pronounced together.

Although the population in Illinois started developing soon after the opening (when several small villages formed Fairview Heights, and St. Clair Square opened), the building boom did not take place until the mid 1990s when O'Fallon and Shiloh began developing farmland as room in Fairview Heights was running out. As traffic increased, so did the need to widen east of Interstate 255 from 4 lanes to 6 lanes, which happened in the Fall of 2007.

Many drivers feel that there is a need to rebuild the tri-level interchange with I-55/70 (usually known as The Split) ^[2]. There is a sharp curve that handles eastbound I-64 traffic at that interchange, and it has led to several tractor-trailer accidents during the past three decades.

Due to its massive reconstruction, Interstate 64 in Missouri has its own website[3].