Abbot-Albert Intersection Closing for Two Days of Underground Utility Work, Repaving

UPDATE: The work was finished by 5:30 p.m. on Friday, November 1, and the intersection is now open again.

The City of East Lansing plans to close the intersection of Abbot Road and Albert Avenue to traffic both Friday and Saturday for infrastructure work related to a water main connection needed to service the ongoing construction of the nearby Abbot building and The Graduate hotel.

The underground utility work begins Friday and City staff anticipate that the intersection will be reopened Saturday, after it has been repaved.

“It will take a good portion of the day Friday to remove the infrastructure and make the water main connection,” said Nicole MacPherson, engineering administrator for the City’s Department of Public Works. “The reason for doing it now is that we want to get the intersection paved while we still have a little bit of weather with us.”

According to the City statement, the intersection closure will require the following additional road closures and traffic detours:

• Abbot Road will be closed to traffic from Grand River Avenue to Albert Avenue. Vehicles headed northbound on Abbot Road will be detoured to M.A.C. Avenue, and through traffic headed southbound on Abbot Road will be detoured to Oakhill Avenue.
• Westbound Albert Avenue will be closed to through traffic from Grove Street to Abbot Road. Through traffic headed westbound on Albert Avenue will be detoured to Grove Street. The Albert Avenue Garage will remain accessible to westbound Albert Avenue traffic.

The Abbot is the big anchor building of the “Park District” project being developed by DRW Convexity. Situated at the corner across from MSU's entrance, The Abbot is set to be a 13-story building with 14,000 square feet of retail space on the ground floor, two floors of private parking above that for 89 vehicles, and about 200 rental apartments housing almost 400 people.

Just west of there, DRW Convexity is building a 10-story building for The Graduate hotel chain. That will have 194 guest rooms, a ballroom on the second frloor, hotel meeting rooms, and a rooftop restaurant and bar.

Pedestrian and business access will be maintained during the construction and City staff will be visiting businesses in the affected area to discuss the planned road closures. These ongoing road closures have not been easy on downtown businesses.

The underground utility work will shift to the 100 block of West Grand River Avenue (the block between Abbot Road and Peoples Church) beginning Monday. MacPherson confirmed that there will be lane closures on West Grand River Avenue during this work, and that the lane closure plan is being finalized and will be publicized later this week.