(July 8, 2015) – The Maryland Department of Transportation’s State Highway Administration (SHA), with assistance from the Maryland State Police (MSP), will temporarily stop traffic on I-81 and I-70 overnights in Washington County for the next few weeks to install and remove portable ATRs (Automatic Traffic Recorders).

SHA placed the devices at eight locations across I-81 between the MD/PA line and US 11 (just south of I-70) overnight on Monday, July 6th using Maryland State Police to hold traffic for just a few minutes at each location. These same devices will be removed early Friday between midnight and 3 a.m., requiring short-term closures of up to about five minutes at each location, including along I-81 at interchanges between US 11 and the Pennsylvania State line.

On Sunday night, July 12, crews will place five additional traffic counting devices across east and westbound I-70 between the Pennsylvania line and I-81 between 11 p.m. and 3 a.m. Crews will return to remove the devices from I-70 on Thursday night, July 16.

Motorists are asked to stay alert for possible short term closures along I-70 and I-81 on these nights and to be patient as crews will work as quickly as possible to install and remove the traffic recorders.

Automatic Traffic Recorders (ATRs) provide engineers and the public up-to-date real-time average daily traffic at hundreds of locations across the state, including data used to plan and prioritize highway improvements.  

Average daily traffic counts on all State maintained roads can be found at this link, http://sha.maryland.gov/Index.aspx?PageId=792.