Route 24 ramp gets go-ahead

The ramp will provide direct access to Freetown and north Fall River, taking the pressure of heavy traffic off local roads and boosting the economic engine for the two communities.

Freetown selectmen chairwoman Jean Fox said the project - the largest to benefit from federal economic stimulus money designated for the repair and improvement of Massachusetts roads - has been years in the planning.

“There is not just a need for this - there’s a critical need,’’ she said. A slight snafu during the recent bidding process on the job nearly brought progress once again to a halt, she said, “but they were able to go around it.’’

The new interchange will be built between Exit 8 to Airport Road and North Main Street in Fall River and Exit 9 to South Main Street in Freetown. The project includes the ramp, which will be designated Exit 8B, as well as construction of new access roads to commercial developments in both communities.

Selectman Lawrence N. Ashley, who also sits on Freetown’s Economic Development and Industrial Commission, said the ramp will provide access to the town’s Riverfront Commercial Park.

“Currently there’s nothing in the park,’’ he said. “The ramp is going to bring in jobs and business.’’

It also dovetails with another transportation plan for the area: expansion of the South Coast Rail, slated to give Freetown a train station.

“We’re redoing the zoning there to allow for industrial and commercial uses,’’ said Ashley. “It’s all coming together for the town. There will be a lot of new opportunities. We really want to bring business in.’’

Stop & Shop has one of its largest regional warehouses in Freetown, and trucks going in and out of the site have put stress on local roads. The new interchange will provide a straight shot between the warehouse and the highway.

In Fall River, officials have been planning for the new ramp since Ed Lambert was mayor in 2000. The city, where the unemployment rate now tops 13 percent, worked on a land swap with the state that would add 300 acres to the Fall River Executive Park in the north section of the city, which would benefit most from the new road.

The executive park is located in a federally-designated “economically disadvantaged area’’ of the state and was awarded a $17 million grant by Governor Deval Patrick earlier this year.

In the land exchange, Fall River put a preservation restriction on 4,300 acres of open space that are now part of the Southeastern Massachusetts Bio-Reserve. The land deal had been pending for years, but was just completed in March, according to Roland Hebert, the Southeast Regional Planning and Economic Development District’s transportation planner.

The ramp project went out to bid last month, after the state’s required Environmental Impact Report on the job was completed this spring.

Officials said work will be done under a “design-build’’ delivery system that results in cost-effective and quickly completed projects. The state’s Notice to Proceed, a final step prior to construction, should be issued by the fall.

The state has received authority from the federal government to spend $438 million on transportation projects under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

Of that, $187.4 million was designated for shovel-ready projects that all went out to bid last month. The rest of the stimulus money must be committed to projects by March 2010.

“We’re really proud of the fact that we’ve got the biggest stimulus project in the state right here in Southeastern Massachusetts,’’ Hebert said.

While the ramp project stagnated, construction costs ballooned. In 2002, it was estimated that the work would cost about $25 million. The cost now stands at $70 million.

“We weren’t sure where the money for this project would come from, but just as we were ready to file the Environmental Impact Report, the governor came up with the stimulus money,’’ Hebert said. “Then the stars aligned.’’

According to Hebert, the state’s focus has been on bridge reconstruction for the last few years, so this project would most probably not have been funded without the federal economic stimulus funds.

As a design-build project, work should move quickly.

“It is designed in small pieces and built as it goes along, so there are no delays,’’ Hebert said.

The ramp should be up and operating in about three years.

Other projects in Southeastern Massachusetts that went out to bid last month thanks to stimulus funds include a $5 million resurfacing of Route 24 in Stoughton and Avon, and a $5.8 million reconstruction of Route 27 at West Street in Brockton.

Christine Legere can be reached at christinelegere@yahoo.com.