Drivers will soon encounter road closures and detours as PennDOT’s multi-year reconstruction of Atherton Street in State College continues.
Beginning Monday, May 15, and continuing until early July, both eastbound lanes of Atherton Street from College Avenue to Beaver Avenue will be closed to install new drainage. Eastbound traffic will be detoured at the North Atherton and College Avenue intersection. The detour will use West College Avenue to South Buckhout Street to West Beaver Avenue to South Atherton Street.
Starting at 6 p.m. on Friday, May 19, Atherton Street westbound will be closed from Beaver Avenue to College Avenue for a 60-hour detour so crews can install new drainage. PennDOT expects the round-the-clock closure to end by 6 a.m. on Monday, May 22. During the closure, eastbound traffic will be diverted to what PennDOT calls the Atherton Street general detour: Park Avenue to University Drive to East College Avenue to U.S. Route 322 to Warner Boulevard. Westbound traffic will be directed to the Beaver Avenue general detour: Route 45 to U.S. Route 322 to East College Avenue.
Access to the Graduate State College hotel, 125 S. Atherton St., will be maintained from College Avenue during the 60-hour detour, and a flagger posted to provide assistance for the duration.
From Monday through Thursday two crews will continue waterline work on South Atherton Street from West Foster Avenue to West Fairmont Avenue. Traffic will follow an alternating pattern controlled by roadway flaggers.
Work on the current, $30.7 million phase of the Atherton Street project began in 2022 and is expected to conclude in the fall of 2024. The project zone stretches from Curtin Avenue to just past Westerly Parkway, and overall work includes adway reconstruction, drainage improvements, water and sewer lines, concrete curbing, sidewalks and detectable warning surfaces, pavement markings and traffic signals and supports.
In unrelated work, overnight road work on College and Beaver Avenues is scheduled from Sunday, May 14, to Friday, May 19.
