WEST VALLEY CITY, Utah -- The Utah Department of Transportation will install the largest pre-cast bridge beams ever in Utah, and the big beams will impact traffic beginning Wednesday morning.
The massive concrete beams will be placed along the technology corridor on I-15 in Lehi.
There are six beams in all, each one more than 200 feet long and weighing nearly a quarter million pounds.
They are among the last pieces of the puzzle that will allow UDOT to widen the freeway in northern Utah county from four to six lanes, in one of the fastest growing parts of the state.
Getting these gargantuan pieces of concrete from the yard in West Valley City all the way to Lehi will require a Herculean effort, one which commuters on I-15 will definitely notice.
"It'll be quite a spectacle," Lee Wegner with Forterra Structural Precast said. "These things are going to convoy down the interstate and they'll see a big, slow-moving piece of concrete going about 20 miles-per-hour down the road."
Wegner says there will be plenty of wide loan signs, flaggers and UHP troopers to help make the move a safe one.
These are the largest, pre-cast bridge beams that have ever been made here in the state of Utah.
The first two beams were being readied for travel Tuesday and weather permitting, are scheduled to begin their journey to Lehi Wednesday morning around nine.
The trip could take a couple hours to make and crews will spend the rest of the day putting the beams in place.
The other four beams will be transported in intervals over the next couple weeks.
