Route 222's $75M overhaul to ease traffic with wider lanes by 2030

A three-year project to reconstruct, widen and repave Route 222 in Manheim Township is expected to begin in 2028, and the public can comment on the plans starting Tuesday.

The state Department of Transportation plans to overhaul a 2.9-mile section of Route 222 located just north of the ongoing Route 30/222 interchange improvement project. By the end of 2030, Route 222 will have three lanes in each direction between Route 30 and the Oregon Pike exit.

Plans and comment forms are available Tuesday through April 30 at lanc.news/PennDOTprojects.

An in-person open house will take place from 5 to 8 p.m. March 31 at Calvary Church, 1051 Landis Valley Road, in Manheim Township.

The project, which has an estimated cost of $75 million, will use the existing grass median to add a lane in each direction of Route 222 for 1.8 miles, and expand the shoulders. The outside northbound lane will end at the off-ramp for the Oregon Pike exit, and the outside southbound lane will begin at the on-ramp from the Oregon Pike exit.

Pavement preservation work, milling and overlay from the Oregon Pike exit north to the Bushong Road bridge over Route 222 are also included in the project. That section will stay two lanes in each direction.

Changes to the profile of the road will increase the vertical clearance of the Landis Valley Road and Hunsicker Road bridges over Route 222. Rehabilitation work is planned for those bridges along with the bridges carrying Route 222 over Jake Landis Road, Creek Road, Lititz Creek and Kurtz Run, as well as the Butter Road bridge over Kurtz Run.

Sound walls could be included in the project, pending results of noise studies that will take place before construction.

The project will add on to the six-lane section of Route 222 that is currently under construction between Route 30 and Stoner Park, just north of Eden Road. That section is part of the ongoing, four-year $72-million Route 30/222 interchange improvement project, which is scheduled to be completed next year.

The highway, which is used by an average of 66,000 vehicles per day, is due for reconstruction because the underlying pavement has reached the end of its useful life, PennDOT District 8 Assistant District Executive for Design Richard Reisinger previously told LNP | LancasterOnline. That makes the surface pavement wear out sooner than it should after normal repaving.

The additional lanes are needed to keep traffic on Route 222 flowing while work is taking place, and Reisinger told LNP | LancasterOnline that keeping them instead of removing them after construction is a wise investment.