Yale Back Open As Crews Make Progress On Widening Project

Yale is back open between 81st and 91st Street as road crews make progress on a widening project.

For the last 120 days, Yale has been closed off. But now that it's back open, crews want to make sure people drive slowly and carefully.

There's still plenty of work to be done to widen this stretch of Yale, but traffic is moving again on the busy road.

"Everybody can move freely through the corridor now, it's 25 miles an hour which is important because we've got a ton of construction still taking place," said City Councilor Phil Lakin.

He said drivers won't have to worry about the road shutting down again. In fact, he said it'll only get better from here.

"From now until September of 2023, Yale will be open and we'll actually see more lanes being opened as construction continues," Lakin said.

That's good news for Joe Caparelli who lives in one of the neighborhoods on this part of Yale.

"It'll be great when it's done, happy for the rest of the neighborhood where we won't have as much traffic through here," said Caparelli.

He said while the road was shut off, so many drivers cut through his neighborhood that the city had to install speed bumps.

"If you go down that way you'll see about 8 or 10 speed humps that they’ve put in, because people are speeding through the neighborhood," said Caparelli.

Lakin said he appreciates the patience of nearby neighborhoods affected by construction. He said crews are now one step closer to making this stretch safer for drivers.

"It's just great that we can connect 81st to 91st, so many people use this corridor to get to work, to school, to their neighbor's homes, and now they can freely do so without having to use Sheridan or Harvard," said Lakin.

Even though Yale is back open, drivers should still be aware of intermittent delays as construction crews move around the area with big equipment.