If you drive I-70 toward Kingdom City, the work zone you’ve been navigating for months is about to look different this week.
MoDOT says the westbound lanes between Callaway County Route M/Hatton (mile marker 144) and U.S. 54 at Kingdom City (Exit 148) are nearly finished being repaved, and traffic is shifting onto them soon as part of the ongoing Improve I-70 project. The change was first reported by KOMU 8.
The westbound shift happens overnight on a Wednesday this month, according to MoDOT’s release. MoDOT hasn’t published the exact calendar date beyond “Wednesday,” so if you’re driving that stretch, watch for signage and slow down through the work zone regardless of which night it lands on. The eastbound shift into the median follows the week of Aug. 10.
Once both shifts are done, traffic in both directions runs on a single narrowed roadway split by a temporary concrete barrier, with lanes down to 10 feet instead of the usual 12. Give yourself extra room and expect to slow down. No lane changes are allowed between mile markers 144-146 and 148-149, so get into position early if you’re exiting at Kingdom City.
Two ramps are also closing for about two months once the shift begins: the ramp from Exit 144 onto eastbound I-70, and the ramp from eastbound I-70 to Exit 148. If you normally use either to get on or off at Kingdom City, plan an alternate route on U.S. 54 or the frontage roads.
This stretch is a few exits past our own corridor, but it’s the same Improve I-70 program that’s already under construction closer to home. The Boonville-to-Rocheport segment — a $104 million, 13-mile third-lane build between Route 5 in Boonville and the Rocheport Bridge, including widened bridges at mile marker 113 and near the Rocheport Bridge itself — broke ground this spring and isn’t expected to wrap until late 2027. The Kingdom City work is the same statewide push to modernize I-70, just further down the road.
If you use I-70 to get into Columbia or points east, the Kingdom City segment is the one you’ll hit first, and it’s worth building a few extra minutes into that drive for the next couple of months while the ramps are closed. We’ll keep an eye on MoDOT’s releases for the exact date the barrier goes up and update if the timeline shifts.
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