For the New Jersey Turnpike Authority, 2017 is the get-it-done year, as the agency sprints to complete an ambitious $7 billion capital construction plan that ends in 2018.

Work starting in 2017 includes eliminating a frustrating bottleneck at a Garden State Parkway exit to I-280, straightening out a complicated interchange in Monmouth County, and starting a bridge deck replacement project on part of the Hudson County extension of the Turnpike.



It's also the year work continues to finish the last phase of the $590 million Parkway widening, which adds 90 miles of new lanes between Toms River and Egg Harbor, said Robert J. Fischer, Turnpike Authority chief engineer.



The authority's $7 billion capital plan is funded through the toll increase approved in 2008, which raised tolls by 40 percent that year and another 50 percent in 2012. About $6 billion has been spent so far.



The potential summer 2017 completion date for reopening all Pulaski Skyway lanes to traffic dictates when the New Jersey Turnpike Authority will start on a $55 million contract to install new bridge decks on six-miles of the westbound Hudson County turnpike extension, which has taken some detoured northbound Skyway traffic.

Work on that section of the extension, which connects I-78 to the Holland Tunnel probably won't start until late 2017, Fischer said. The project has been on hold since 2014 while the Skyway's northbound lanes were closed to replace the bridge deck.

New Parkway exit won't take cash for toll

Possibly one of the most frustrating bottlenecks for Parkway drivers at Exit 145 to I-280 is headed for oblivion as work starts in 2017 to replace bridges that carry Central Avenue in East Orange over the highway. That allows more exit lanes to be to be built from the Parkway and I-280.

An annoying left lane exit from the Parkway to Route 17 at Exit 163 in Bergen County is a bad memory. Exit ramps have been opened on the right side of the highway and remaining bridge work is expected to be completed in mid-2017.

The $160 million rebuilding of Exit 14A and the toll plaza in Bayonne is 65 percent complete. However the discovery of previously unknown underground storage tanks and other obstructions could delay the project beyond an Oct. 2018 completion date.

The authority will spend $42.7 million in 2017 to complete two Parkway widening projects, said Tom Feeney, an authority spokesman. A $85 million project to widen the Parkway in Egg Harbor Township and upgrade Interchanges 36, 37 and 38, is 64 percent complete and expected to be finished in late August 2018.

That includes $10 million to rebuild the exit to the Atlantic City Expressway.

Another $45 million contract widens the Parkway between Galloway and Egg Harbor, and includes work on five bridges and replacement of one other span. That's scheduled to be completed in June 2018.



With the opening of a new $142 million southbound Great Egg Harbor bridge, the authority is rebuilding the northbound bridge and has started demolishing the old southbound span. Work on the $42 million northbound bridge rehabilitation has a 2019 completion date.



The last phase of the Exit 105 construction in Tinton Falls is to be completed in 2018. That $20 million project, to build the Wayside Connector, provides a link between the southbound Parkway and Route 18, via a Wayside Road ramp. That work is 75 percent completed



A construction contract to replace four Parkway bridges at Exit 109 over Newman Springs Road and building a flyover ramp between Newman Springs and the Parkway is scheduled to be awarded in 2017. Plans call for expanding the overcrowded park and ride lot located at the exit.



Work continues to build a full interchange at Exit 125 in Sayreville. That work to add a northbound entrance and a southbound exit ramp and make local street improvements, has a 2018 completion date.

Larry Higgs may be reached at lhiggs@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @commutinglarry. Find NJ.com on Facebook.