If you’ve ever driven between Lafayette and Delphi, you know the story about Indiana 25.
It’s narrow, with what the Indiana Department of Transportation calls “minimal earth shoulders” that came with the circa-1931 design.
It’s hilly. The rolling terrain, while a true Indiana blessing on a fall Sunday afternoon, makes for parade conditions from Lafayette to Delphi.
It’s curvy. What the hills can’t eliminate in the passing department, the curves wipe out. INDOT tried to handle that problem in the old days with something known as three-lane hill. The half-mile stretch of passing lane wasn’t quite enough to get the job done and left too many cars squeezed onto the shoulder, into oncoming traffic or scattered on nearby yards.
Bottom line: Indiana 25 between Lafayette and Delphi has been too dangerous for too long. Getting traffic off Indiana 25 onto a safer road was part of the dream of this southern section of the Hoosier Heartland Highway, a limited-access corridor that eventually will connect Interstate 65 in Lafayette with Interstate 69 in Fort Wayne.
On Wednesday morning, Gov. Mitch Daniels and other state and local officials will open the Lafayette-to-Delphi leg with a ceremony in Delphi. It’s a long time coming, considering the official conversations about Hoosier Heartland started in 1985.
The promise of commerce drove much of the Hoosier Heartland project. And that’s a big reason Daniels funneled part of his $3.8 billion Major Moves transportation plan the Hoosier Heartland’s way. That put the project ahead of schedule by eight years. But the safety benefits are difficult to deny.
The project didn’t come without some pain — just ask homeowners and other reluctant property sellers along the route. But this week should reveal why the Hoosier Heartland was worth pursuing — and worth finishing early.