About the Project
Dixie Highway is one of Louisville Metro’s busiest, widest and most dangerous transportation corridors. Its fatality rate is more than three times the rate of similar highways.
Improving safety, mobility and economic development are vital to the thousands of residents and businesses that depend on Dixie Highway. More than 60,000 drivers and more than 4,000 transit riders travel this busy corridor daily.
About The New Dixie Highway Project
The New Dixie Highway project will focus on three major goals:
- Making Dixie Highway safer for drivers and pedestrians
- Improving traffic flow between the Gene Snyder Freeway and downtown
- Creating a more efficient and more reliable transit service for TARC riders
To achieve those goals, the project will concentrate on three major areas of improvement:
- Roadway safety and design improvements, including raised medians along the most congested and dangerous section (Crums Lane to Greenwood Road)
- A new Intelligent Transportation System that will improve and coordinate traffic signal timing along the entire corridor
- The region’s first bus rapid transit route, a line of priority buses and more than two dozen highly visible stations that will improve travel times for both transit riders and motorists
The New Dixie Highway is the first project under Mayor Greg Fischer’s MOVE Louisville initiative, which seeks to modernize and improve transportation across the metro area
The project is fueled by a combination of federal, state and local funds. Work will follow priorities outlined in the 2015 U.S. Department of Transportation TIGER Grant application.
(Click here to see a corridor map highlighting project plans)
Improving Driver/Pedestrian Safety
Improving safety along Dixie Highway is the No. 1 priority of The New Dixie Highway project. Between the years 2010-14, the New Dixie project area was the scene for 34 traffic-related fatalities. This rate of fatal crashes is more than three times the rate of similar roadways in Kentucky.
As part of the Louisville Metro Complete Streets initiative, The New Dixie Highway project will make infrastructure improvements in high-traffic areas (between Crums Lane and Greenwood Road), including:
- More pedestrian pathways
- Improved connections in the most dangerous areas, especially for pedestrians and bus riders
- Increased use of raised medians to improve safety for left turns
- Some driveway consolidations
- Signage and striping upgrades for lanes and crosswalks
- Other safety enhancements
Creating a Smarter Traffic Flow
A key element of The New Dixie Highway project will be the use of Intelligent Transportation System/Advanced Traffic Management System technology. The new technology will monitor vehicle traffic and adjust traffic signal timing to improve traffic flow and relieve congestion, which may also reduce crashes.
The system will be connected to Louisville’s traffic-management system using fiber-optic lines that will be able to support future communications technology for intersecting streets, cameras, dynamic message signs and other future ITS systems and equipment.
Adding RAPID - Louisville's First Bus Rapid Transit Service
The launch of Louisville’s first bus rapid transit (BRT) line. The Rapid will offer a more convenient option for some of those traveling on Dixie Highway. The new branded shelters and pylons will also offer a new look and feel to the Dixie Highway corridor. This system, which eventually could be expanded to other parts of TARC’s service area, will include:
- 37 distinctive BRT stops along the length of the Dixie Highway corridor and into downtown
- TARC-designated queue-jump lanes and bus turnouts that make it safer and easier for buses to re-enter traffic after stops
- A Traffic Signal Priority system connected with the Intelligent Transportation System
- Newly branded buses designated for the Dixie Highway corridor
- Sidewalk improvements to improve access to bus rapid transit stations
(Click here for a list and map of planned BRT stops)
