BECKLEY, W.Va. — A transportation plaza at Beckley and Bluestone on the West Virginia Turnpike is expected to be completed by the end of the year.
Officials from the West Virginia Parkway Department got an up-close look at the work being done at the Beckley site near Tamarac on Monday as part of the department’s monthly meeting.
Parkways Authority
Managing Director
Jeff Miller
“You can see things really starting to take shape,” Parkways Authority Executive Director Jeff Miller told MetroNews. “They’re doing work on the interior of the facility and the canopy right now, which I think will be iconic for both of them.”
Demolition of the old Travel Plaza building began last spring. St. Albans-based contractor Paramount Builders will be paid $122.8 million to rebuild the facility. Work on the Morton Travel Plaza in Kanawha County is scheduled to begin next spring.
Miller said work at Bluestone in Mercer County is a little further along than the Beckley site, but he expects both to be completed in time for the Thanksgiving holiday travel season.
“What people will see is a nice facility with very well-lit areas, beautiful landscaping and great amenities for travelers,” Miller said. “It’s going to be a nice place for families and commercial truck drivers to stop and feel like they’re in a safe environment.”
Miller previously told MetroNews that the anchor will be Beckley’s new Travel Plaza, which when completed will feature multiple restaurants, including a Wendy’s, Starbucks, Popeyes and a 24-hour convenience store, as well as a permanent outdoor dining structure like a food truck.
Beckley will add 50 parking spaces for tractor-trailers and install 16 charging stations for electric vehicles, Miller said.
Mr Miller said there was initially a lot of on-site work at both sites, including replacing fuel tanks and draining them.
“There was a lot of work that had to be done at ground level before we could actually start construction or get to the vertical structure stage,” he said.
Miller added that the project does not involve significant additional construction costs, and he is evaluating the contractors’ initial bids.
“I think the contractors were very upfront about their plans from the beginning when they bid and they took into account all the contingencies on their side,” Miller said.
