PROGRESS 2025: Construction to resume on King Coal Highway near Bluefield
Construction will soon be underway on another section of the King Coal Highway near Bluefield.
Former Gov. Jim Justice joined local and state officials last November for what was largely a ceremonial groundbreaking for the $58 million project.
The groundbreaking ceremony was held on November 4, one day before the Nov. 5 election, but because winter weather was fast approaching, state highway officials at the time advised that actual construction work wouldn't get underway until this spring.
That work will pick-up where the highway corridor currently comes to an abrupt end along Airport Road.
Officials with the West Virginia Department of Transportation have not yet confirmed when the actual construction will begin, but it is expected to be this spring.
The new contract will take the King Coal Highway another 2.5 miles from Airport Road toward Littlesburg Road, near Route 20 and the Bluewell community.
A third contract also still in the planning stages will extend the King Coal Highway another five miles from the Littlesburg Road area toward the Montcalm community once that contract is finalized and awarded.
Ryland Musick, District 10 Engineer for the West Virginia Division of Highways District 10 office, said the Littlesburg Road to Montcalm section of the King Coal Highway is still under environmental review.
It's not clear how long that ongoing review will take. A contract award date for that section of the King Coal Highway has not yet been announced.
That 4.3 mile stretch of the King Coal Highway will go from Montcalm (County Route 11/4) in the north to Littlesburg Road (or West Virginia Route 20) in the south where it will connect to the existing section of the King Coal Highway at Airport Road.
The King Coal Highway is West Virginia's local corridor of the future Interstate 73/74/75 routing. In West Virginia, it will extend 95 miles through Mercer, McDowell, Mingo, Wyoming and Wayne countries along or near currently existing U.S. 52 from U.S. 119 near Williamson to Interstate 77 in Bluefield.
In the bigger picture, the final Interstate 73/74/75 routing will extend from Detroit, Michigan to Myrtle Beach, S.C, opening up a large swath of Southern West Virginia to interstate access.
Getting to this point in the project has been a long journey.
Work on the King Coal Highway in Bluefield dates back to the year 2001.
But the first usable section of the roadway in Mercer County wasn't opened to traffic until late 2023.
Gov. Jim Justice, along with a host of local and state officials, were on hand for that ceremony, which marked the culmination of a project dating back to 2001. That's when work began on the K.A. Ammar Interchange at Bluefield — the first local segment of the King Coal Highway. The previous phase of the project got underway a decade earlier and was finished in 2008. It included the construction of the twin interstate bridges high above Stoney Ridge, which was later named the Christine West Bridge by the West Virginia Legislature.
However, after 2008, work on the King Coal Highway in Bluefield was stalled for more than a decade due to a lack of federal funding needed to continue the project.
That's why area residents started calling the bridge above Stoney Ridge the 'bridge to nowhere.' Work on the project finally resumed in 2018 through Justice's Roads to Prosperity Program, which awarded a $68 million contract for the Airport Road stretch of the new interstate corridor.
This usable section of the four-lane corridor extends more than two miles before crossing Kee Dam at Airport Road. Motorists now travel on the roadway each day, including both local residents and out-of-state visitors, many of whom are traveling to the region to ride the Hatfield-McCoy Trail system.
During the Dec. 13, 2023 opening ceremony, Justice vowed to continue construction on the new interstate corridor. He is now a U.S. senator in Washington serving in the Mountain State, and in a position of power to help secure federal funding for future sections of the new four-lane corridor.
During the 2023 opening ceremony, a parade of vehicles crossed the former Bridge to Nowhere for the first time, including a number of antique cars that were chosen to participate in the special event.
Justice told the Daily Telegraph after the Dec. 13 ceremony that the bridge should have opened years earlier.
'It's the culmination in my opinion of a dream, but also a nightmare,' Justice said after the ribbon cutting. 'I mean, for crying out loud, to sit here for decades. It's ridiculous. It's totally ridiculous. And I hope you know from my standpoint, I'm the most impatient guy in town. And I wanted it to happen and we got it done some way, some how with a lot of great work, and a lot of great people were there. It should have been done a long, long time ago. It could have been done decades before my watch, but we got it done.'
The King Coal Highway will eventually reach into McDowell County and Wyoming counties.
New West Virginia Gov. Patrick Morrisey has not yet issued any statements with regards to the King Coal Highway project.
— Contact Charles Owens at cowens@bdtonline.com. Follow him @BDTOwens
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