Indiana leaders declare victory in I-69 interchange opening: ‘Find something else to doubt’

A trio of Hoosier governors — current and former — gleefully cut the checkered tape Tuesday on the final interchange of a mammoth project that took nearly a century to become reality: the Evansville-to-Indianapolis leg of Interstate 69.

The $4.3 billion project will open three years ahead of a scheduled 2027 target, and enable drivers to zoom from Canada to Indiana’s southern edge without encountering a single stoplight.

“This was an investment in us. This was an investment in our future,” Gov. Eric Holcomb told dozens of elected officials, agency leaders, contractors and others assembled beneath a white tent pitched over the sun-warmed asphalt.

“This was an investment in realizing our potential,” Holcomb continued, standing beside former Govs. Mike Pence and Mitch Daniels. “And I’m just proud to be with all of you and my predecessors who led the charge to be able to celebrate this day.”

The Indiana Department of Transportation began construction on the 142-mile project in 2008. It opened the first three segments in 2012, and the next two in 2015 and 2018.

“Finish Line,” the last and priciest piece, has been under construction since 2019. It cost $2 billion.

But on Tuesday, its final interchange on the southwest side of Indianapolis will open southbound. It’ll welcome northbound traffic later this week on or after Friday, according to INDOT.

Finish Line involved construction of 10 new interchanges, 35 lane miles of local access roads and upgrades to more than 26 miles of State Road 37 to bring it up to Interstate standards, per INDOT.

Holcomb likened completion to victory over the project’s naysayers.

“This has turned a lot of cynics. They’re going to have to find something else to doubt in their lifetime,” he said. “But it’s not going to be I-69 anymore, as of today.”

Pence celebrated the finished project as “more than just a highway.” He called it “a monument to the determination of the people of Indiana.”

Daniels, who kick-started construction with his 2006 transportation funding plan “Major Moves,” described trying to pull the state out of an infrastructure gap worth $2.5 billion.

He was one of four people in a windowless room, sorting through bids for his controversial plan to privatize the Indiana Toll Road via a long-term lease.

“When we opened the last envelope and saw a bid for essentially $4 billion cash, we all instantly saw a whole new future,” Daniels told the crowd. “And I’m not stretching when I say: I saw this day. I didn’t know how long it would take, but I saw this day.”

For Daniels, I-69 represents connection to the rest of the state.

“There is no place too small, there is no place too remote for us to care about it and to … pull into the Hoosier family and help to flourish if we can,” Daniels said.

Hoosiers from Evansville and the rest of southwest Indiana have led the charge to build an interstate connection to Indianapolis. They dreamed up the idea by at least the 1940s, when what is now INDOT first considered embarking on such a project.

Success took decades of politicking at the local, state and national levels, and myriad required environmental studies, with public comment sessions and sustained opposition.

There’s still some work left. The area near the interchange will remain an “active construction zone” through the end of 2024, per INDOT spokeswoman Natalie Garrett.

The agency is working to add an additional lane to each direction of I-465 between I-65 and I-70, on the southwest side of Indianapolis.