This is what the message sign at I-70 westbound and Ward Road was reading before noon today. FasTracks tunnel construction wrapped up early and the highway reopened.

Denver Transit Construction Group finished placing girders for a FasTracks light rail tunnel and repaving westbound Interstate 70 at Sixth Avenue on Sunday morning, and reopened the highway to traffic almost a day ahead of schedule despite the weekend snowstorm.

DTCG spokeswoman Kathy Berumen said “all went well” and the closure that had been scheduled to last until 5:30 Monday morning was lifted on Sunday morning.

With close cooperation from Colorado Department of Transportation maintenance personnel, the work area was kept clear of snow so that Lawrence Construction, the subcontractor to DTCG that did the work, was able to get the girders in place to support I-70 over the future tunnel, backfill the area, pave and stripe the new lanes while the snow flew fast and furious.

The girders were set over concrete caisson piers that had been drilled and poured within the ground under the I-70 embankment over Sixth Avenue. DTCG did the same thing under the eastbound embankment several weeks ago.

A new deck and paving were set over the girders and the highway reopened. Now that both eastbound and westbound lanes have, in effect, a tunnel framework build within them, DTCG will excavate the soil out from underneath them to form the tunnel for the West Corridor light rail project.

The method is called “top down construction.”

“We were prepared for the bad weather,” Berumen said.

She said that according to Josh Pategas, DTCG’s Area 1 engineer who is in charge of this location, CDOT’s assistance in keeping snow clear from the work zone was instrumental in keeping work moving along through Saturday night.

“The highway was supposed to open at 5:30 am tomorrow so this is great news,” Berumen said.

You can read about the top-down construction method here.

Using this method, with the eastbound work completed during a weekend closure Oct. 23-25, on-highway construction work that could have gone on for several months was reduced to two weekends. Workers can complete the tunnel work without impacting the highway above.