The Amazon and GM battery plants coming to St. Joe County are expected to generate so much traffic that the state is considering building an interchange on State Road 2 that it’s only used on interstates.
It’s called a diverging diamond interchange and it’s become increasingly popular among federal and state traffic planners. Like a traditional diamond interchange, a new bridge would carry Larrison Boulevard or Strawberry Road traffic over State Road 2.
But a diverging diamond interchange requires traffic on the overpass to briefly drive on the opposite side of the road at the start and end of the bridge. Right turns work the same but DDI’s allow simpler left turns between the interchange and the highway.
Bill Schalliol is the county’s economic development director.
There are now 150 diverging diamonds in the U.S. and four in Indiana. Schalliol says he driven them on I-94 as you enter Wisconsin from Illinois and another in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee.
"It actually drives really well," Schalliol said. "You don't know that you're in it until you're in it, and then when you got out of it, you're like, well, that made sense."
Schalliol says the state could tell the county its plans by the end of the month. Under the latest scenario envisioned, the state would pay $31 million of the project’s $50 million cost. Amazon would pay $7 million, leaving $12 million for the county to raise through a bond issue.
