Noblesville to begin assessing S.R. 37 interchange options

While construction is still years away, planning is underway to revamp Noblesville’s section of State Road 37.

The Indiana Department of Transportation and the city of Noblesville are setting the stage to overhaul four intersections along a 2-mile stretch of S.R. 37 at Greenfield Avenue, Town and Country Boulevard, Pleasant Street and State Road 32/38.

INDOT Greenfield District Senior Project Manager Jennifer Beck said the design and cost of the project in Noblesville will not be set until late this year. Construction work is not expected to begin until 2028 or 2029.

“We don’t have a design to show you. We don’t have costs to show you. We don’t have a schedule to show you,” Beck said. “We are truly at Day 1 of design. And it is a five-year development process to go from where we are now to a complete plan set, right of way acquired, ready to build, let’s go. So that gives you an idea of how far we are out from actual construction happening.”

About 30,000 to 35,000 drivers use S.R. 37 in Noblesville each day. It is less traveled than S.R. 37 in Fishers, which has about 50,000 drivers daily. However, Beck noted that the roadway in Noblesville has a higher crash frequency than many roadways in the state, with nearly 400 crashes from 2016 to 2019.

Along with improving driver safety, Noblesville City Engineer Alison Krupski said, the project will reduce congestion at the four intersections, which back up each day at rush hour, and will focus on improving pedestrian access.

Over the next year, Krupski said, INDOT and the city will analyze each intersection to determine how it should be restructured.

The signal-controlled intersections could become grade-separated interchanges on a sunken expressway like those in Fishers at East 126th, 131st and 146th streets and the one being built at 141st Street. One or more of the intersections could be replaced with a right-in, right-out configuration like at East 135th Street.

Krupski said the nature of S.R. 37 is different in Noblesville than in Fishers. In Noblesville, the road curves and travels through a tightly packed commercial district from Town and Country Boulevard to S.R. 32/38. Cherry Street intersects S.R. 37 about 1/10th of a mile south of S.R. 32/38, and Cumberland Road is roughly 100 yards west of the intersection at S.R. 32/38, further complicating the project.

“[Greenfield Avenue] can kind of be plucked out on its own,” she said. “But the other portions as you’re going through the business corridor along State Road 37, we’ll have to definitely look at that with a fine-tooth comb and make sure that we’re reducing impact as much as we can along the corridor.”

Mayor Chris Jensen said sunken roadways similar to the three Fishers intersections is the preferred option, but “you have to measure that against cost and impact.”

“The project isn’t happening tomorrow, but it is going to come up, and it is going to happen,” he said.

Finishing and preparing

Conversations about alleviating congestion on S.R. 37 from Interstate 69 to S.R. 32/38 began in 2005 and gained momentum four years later, when Hamilton County leaders voted to study the corridor.

In late 2015, state and county officials announced that $100 million of state funding had been set aside to reconstruct 2 miles of the corridor—from 126th to 146th streets—and Fishers and Hamilton County pledged to split an additional $24 million to make the project a reality.

As part of the long-term plan for S.R. 37, Fishers and Hamilton County also pledged $4.5 million each to Noblesville’s section of the project.

Construction in Fishers began in 2019, but the initial $124 million estimate proved to be optimistic. A bad drainage estimate, unexpected utility relocations, costly land acquisitions and pandemic-related inflation increased the price tag to $160 million, with the city and county responsible for covering cost overruns.

“COVID was a big hit for our industry,” Beck said. “That really kind of skyrocketed costs and totally screwed up a lot of our funding plans.”

Crews completed work at 126th, 131st, 135th and 146th streets from 2020 to 2022, but the intersection at 141st Street became a lingering headache for local officials, drivers and business owners.

In June 2022, Fishers rejected three bids that were higher than the budgeted $26.6 million to turn the intersection into a roundabout. In the interim, a right-in, right-out configuration at 141st Street was put in place in early 2023. Drivers were only able to make a right turn onto and off of S.R. 37.

In the summer of 2023, Fishers and Hamilton County increased their maximum contributions for 141st Street from $13.3 million to $20 million, for a total of $40 million. Indianapolis-based Gradex Inc. received a winning bid of $37.6 million to build the interchange, and construction began last spring.

Meanwhile, in Noblesville, the city was managing multiple road projects, including the $113 million, three-phase Pleasant Street project, a new bridge on Little Chicago Road and multiple roundabouts, while INDOT worked to resurface S.R. 32 in the city’s downtown.

Jensen said the delays in Fishers gave Noblesville time to “focus internally” on advancing ongoing road projects before moving on to S.R. 37.

“Traffic is not fun,” he said. “Construction is incredibly inconveniencing for everybody, myself included. But we’re doing the best we can.”

Business pains

Business owners near the intersection of S.R. 37 and 141st Street felt the pinch when the right-in, right-out was in place, and they say the pain has gotten worse since the interchange construction began.

Chris Lechner at the Just Vapor vape shop at 9239 E. 141st St. said sales decreased 30% when 141st Street was closed to left-hand turns. Since construction began, he said, business has dropped 50%.

“Not being able to exit on and off of 37 has really hurt us because a lot of our traffic was [from] the neighborhood on the other side of 37, and they would just cut across,” Lechner said. “Now they have to go around, and a lot of them are just going to the stores that are on that side instead of coming around.”

While the interchange is projected to be finished late this year, Lechner said the drop in business during construction has created a perilous situation for the shop.

“It’s just day-to-day, basically,” he said. “People are just frustrated with all the construction. They will avoid it like the plague.”

Mike Galford, general manager at Omega Autosports of Fishers, a used-car dealership, said his business has not suffered as much because many customers purchase vehicles online, but he said it was frustrating to see other interchanges be completed while 141st Street remained in limbo.

“I figured they’d just leave it right-turn once everybody got used to it,” Galford said. “The businesses definitely would’ve been better served.”

Lechner advised Noblesville business owners along S.R. 37 to “brace now and do whatever you can to pad yourself as much as possible because once they start, there’s nothing really you can do about it.”

“People will automatically go to someplace else just because they don’t want to have to deal with traffic, so prepare the best way you can now,” he said. “All you can do is just buckle up and hang on.”

Jensen said it will be important for the city to communicate with business owners about construction timelines and what they can expect once work gets underway.

“For us, it’s a matter of communicate, communicate, communicate,” he said, “making sure we’re trying to directly target those business owners and give them the data they need to be successful.”

Beck said Noblesville residents and business owners have access to a survey where they can provide input about what upgrades they want on S.R. 37, ask questions and express concerns. She said INDOT was able to avoid business relocations in Fishers, but the more compacted nature of the roadway in Noblesville could make that difficult.

“That’s why we want to hear from everyone and kind of gauge what improvements are really important to people so that when we have to make some of those tough decisions, we’re doing it knowing we’re achieving the goal that people want us to achieve, not just blindly in our own tunnel of, ‘This is what INDOT thinks we should do,’” she said.

Several Noblesville business owners contacted by IBJ said they do not know enough about the project yet to be able to comment on how it could impact their operations.

However, Brian Kahn, general manager of Floors to Your Home near the intersection of S.R. 37 and Greenfield Avenue, said the biggest short-term impact of construction will be access to his store, while long term, he fears business will be hurt by a lack of visibility if an interchange is built.

“We rely on the visibility of 37 and the access of Greenfield Avenue to get customers,” he said, “so it’s going to be a tremendous, tremendous impact.”•