ST. CLOUD (WJON News) -- The Highway 10 and Highway 23 interchange project is in the home stretch. There's less than three weeks before the project has to be done.

MnDOT Project Manager Rob Abfalter says Highway 23 is pretty much ready to open to four lanes of traffic, but they need to finish a barrier on Highway 10 first.

Placing that median barrier between the two lanes right now, they started that on Saturday. That's a key component to get that barrier placed and get the strength required so we can take away the temporary barrier down on 10, and then we have to work on the grinding and striping on 10 after that's complete.

Abfalter says the new 4th Street Bridge will likely open at the same time as the two highways. He says the city is planning a ribbon cutting for the bridge later this month.

Contractors are doing a lot of work on the side streets and frontage roads getting the final layer of pavement down which they are hoping to finalize this week.

The detours will stay in place until the project is done.

The new signal systems on Highway 23 at the ramps and loops are ready but they will remain off until everything opens, once they are activated MnDOT will monitor and adjust the timing during the first few weeks.

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The deadline to be done is November 3rd for the two-year $43.7 million project.

Abfalter says some punch list - or smaller items - might need to be finished in the spring.

Abfalter was on the News @ Noon Show on WJON once a month during the construction season last year and this year giving us updates on the big project.

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