Northbound Route 29 exit ramp to Fontaine Avenue closed Sunday night

The northbound Route 29 exit ramp to Fontaine Avenue in Albemarle County will be closed on Sunday evening for paving operations.

The ramp will be closed from 8 p.m. Sunday to 6 a.m. Monday. During the closure, drivers will be detoured to the Route 250 (Ivy Road) interchange, turn left, reenter the highway on the southbound side and use the southbound exit to access Fontaine Avenue.

The work is part of an ongoing project to add an option lane – a through/right-merge lane – at the Fontaine Avenue exit from northbound Route 29.

The Fontaine Avenue ramp improvement project is one of two projects in the first phase of a six-project package of improvements to Albemarle County roads in a $28.5 million design-build contract awarded to Curtis Contracting Inc. of West Point. Wallace Montgomery of Vienna is providing design services for the projects.

The second project in the first phase involves reconfiguring the I-64 interchange by eliminating the loop ramp from southbound Route 29 to eastbound I-64. The current ramp configuration results in two “weave” conditions with cars entering and exiting I-64. The loop ramp will be replaced with dual left-turn lanes on southbound Route 29. Traffic will use the ramp that now serves northbound Route 29 to eastbound I-64 traffic.

The remaining four projects will be constructed in two additional phases:

• A connector road between Berkmar Drive and Rio Mills Road just north of the South Fork Rivanna River.
• A diverging diamond interchange at the Route 250 exit from I-64 at Pantops
• A roundabout at Route 250 (Rockfish Gap Turnpike) and Route 151 (Critzers Shop Road) in Afton
• A roundabout at Route 20 (Stony Point Road) and Route 649 (Proffit Road)

Construction of all six projects will be completed in the spring of 2023. More information about the projects can be found on VDOT’s website at www.virginiadot.org/projects/culpeper/albdesignbuild.asp

Updates and other real-time travel information can be found on the 511 Virginia website, the free VDOT 511 mobile app or by calling 511 from any phone in Virginia. Local updates are also posted to Twitter.com/VaDOTCulp.