Pekin officials held a groundbreaking ceremony for the latest construction phase of Veterans Drive. The more than three-mile stretch runs from Commercial Drive near the Wal-Mart to Route 29. Pekin Mayor Laurie Barra says the finished project will make travel more efficient:
“Because it’s going to take a lot of the traffic that’s on Court Street, which is Route 9, and it will swing it on the outskirts of Pekin so the ease of getting from one place to another will be much easier,” Barra says.
The latest Veterans drive stretch cost $20 million in state funding. It’s planned to be complete October 2015. The portion is part of the larger ring-road project to connect I-474 with Route Nine. The Northernmost corridor is in the engineering study phase.