The Cross County Major Transportation Investment Analysis (MTIA), completed by East-West Gateway in partnership with MoDOT and Metro in 1997, resulted in a range of proposed highway and transit improvements in central St. Louis County and City.  Area leaders at that time decided not to pursue a southward extension of I-170 from its current terminus at I-64/U.S. 40.  The result of that decision is that existing arterial roadways, including Brentwood Boulevard, Big Bend Boulevard and Hanley Road/Laclede Station Road must continue to serve as the de-facto I-170 south of I-64/U.S. 40, providing regional north-south mobility for a large portion of central St. Louis County.

To address some of the growing needs in this region, the Hanley Road Corridor Study and the I-44 at Shrewsbury Planning Study, both completed in 2004 under the direction of St. Louis County and MoDOT respectively, set the stage for efforts to improve mobility in the Hanley Road corridor.  Read the documents for each Study.

Since completion of those studies, both St. Louis County and MoDOT have made progress in making those improvements a reality.  The recommended alternative for I-44 at Shrewsbury has been included on East-West Gateway’s Legacy 2030 Long Range Plan.   This project, however, is currently unfunded.

As part of the Federal Transportation Bill (SAFETEA-LU) passed in 2005, St. Louis County received an earmark of $8M for improvements in the Hanley Road corridor.  Those improvements are currently being used for the design and initial implementation of Phase 1 – a new intersection between Hanley Road and Manchester Road and widening from four to six travel lanes from Flora Avenue to approximately Litzsinger Road.

Also in the recent past, the City of Clayton in partnership with St. Louis County and the City of Richmond Heights, initiated the Clayton-Hanley Corridor Study which will be investigating the existing and future needs the portion of Hanley Road between I-64 and Maryland Avenue.