TDOT's $69.4M widening of Summer Avenue in Memphis, a project 25+ years in the making, focuses on traffic flow and safety. The 2-mile expansion adds lanes, bridges, bike paths, and sidewalks, anticipating completion by June 2028 after decades of planning and delays.
TDOT map
The Tennessee Department of Transportation (TDOT) began its nearly $70 million widening project on Summer Avenue in Memphis.
The Tennessee Department of Transportation (TDOT) began its nearly $70 million widening project on Summer Avenue in Memphis on June 9, 2025, after more than 25 years of planning.
The effort is aimed at improving traffic flow and enhancing safety for all users of the busy and vital transportation corridor east of the city's downtown.
As a result, traffic on the roadway is now reduced to one lane in each direction with a turn lane for construction personnel. The project also has brought temporary lane closures, traffic shifts and weekend intersection closures.
"Anything to improve the roads in Memphis, I'm all for it," said Memphis resident Keith Proctor in an interview with WATN-TV. "Raise my taxes if you got to, I just want better roads."
TDOT said the project will stretch nearly 2 mi. from near Interstate 40 northeast to a point east of Sycamore View Road.
"Anytime we're looking at widening a stretch of road, it's economic community growth," said TDOT Regional Communications Officer Nichole Lawrence. "Safety measures are also a big factor of what we look at when we're looking to widen a road."
The expansion of Summer Avenue will add an extra lane in each direction to transform it into three lanes each way with a turning lane. Crews also will replace two bridges over the Wolf River and Fletcher Creek, which are currently seismically deficient, and construct bike lanes and sidewalks to improve access for pedestrians and cyclists.
"I believe that [work at the] Fletcher Creek area is what you'll see first, so there's lots of clearing [and] there's lots of utility work that goes along with this project as well," Lawrence said in speaking with the Memphis ABC affiliate.
"The better the roads, the more tourism, the more money for Memphis," said Proctor.
With construction happening day and night, TDOT is urging drivers to stay alert.
"We need to make sure that you are lowering your speed, you're paying attention and just really making sure that you are doing your part as the driver and … owning that responsibility while you're driving through our work zones," Lawrence said.
The 1.8-mi.-long road improvement work along Summer Avenue/Tennessee Highway 1/U.S. Highway 70 was awarded to Bell & Associates in Collegedale, Tenn. for $69.4 million, according to TDOT.
The project was identified for funding in the state agency's 10-Year Project Plan and will be paid for through Tennessee's Transportation Modernization Act.
When completed, Summer Avenue's six 11-ft.-wide travel lanes, 12-ft.-wide center two-way left turn lane, and two 4-ft.-wide bike lanes with a 3-ft. buffer, along with new curb and gutter in both directions, will all fit within 116 ft. of the right-of-way, TDOT noted on its online project page.
The roadway's pavement will be milled and overlaid from White Station Road to the beginning of the project near the I-40 ramp so as to re-stripe Summer Avenue to carry the proposed bike lane to White Station Road.
In addition, the bridge over Wolf River will include a 12-ft.-wide multi-use path to coincide with improvements to be constructed as part of the Wolf River Greenway.
Other upgrades along Summer Avenue will include dual left turn lanes at the intersection of Bartlett Road and the intersection of Sycamore View Road. Roadway lighting also is proposed along the route and new signals will be installed along Summer at its intersections with White Station Road, Bartlett Road/Shelby Oaks Drive and Sycamore View Road.
The project is expected to be completed by June 30, 2028.
Very Long, Winding Road to Start of Construction
The idea to expand Summer Avenue has been around for nearly 40 years as TDOT first identified the need to widen it from I-40 to Elmore Road as part of the Accelerated Primary Highway Plan that accompanied the gasoline tax increase passed by Tennessee's 94th General Assembly in 1986.
What followed was a long and drawn out path that finally ended June 8, 2025, with the beginning of construction on Summer Avenue.
Background data on the project in the 1980s indicated an insufficient level of service for the roadway, which led to the creation and approval of a TDOT Advanced Planning Report for the street in 1997 that addressed its needed improvements. Survey and design began immediately, followed by an environmental assessment (EA) in 1998.
Based on the EA, the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) approved a Finding of No Significant Impact (FONSI) in May 1999, the authorization to proceed to the ROW phase three months later, and the beginning of ROW acquisition in early 2000.
TDOT also identified the Summer Avenue project as a candidate for the agency's Expedited Project Delivery (EPD) program, aimed at finding and recommending improvement options that are feasible, cost effective and provide improved safety and mobility.
However, in 2014, TDOT placed the project on hold to conduct an EPD review, a process that lasted two years.
For construction purposes, the street expansion project was separated into two sections: from I-40 to one-tenth of a mile north of Sycamore View Road, and a second one from there to a tenth of a mile north of Elmore Road. The EPD review addressed both sections of the project.
A reevaluation of the EA/FONSI with a focus on the section of Summer Avenue from I-40 (east of Macon Road) to north of Sycamore View Road was approved by FHWA in July 2021. A second reevaluation was performed and approved in May 2022.
While the first segment of the project is now under way, the second portion of the overall construction is slated to get under way between 2026 and 2030, according to TDOT.
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