New I-285 eastbound ramp to Ashford Dunwoody opens Sunday

Another milestone in I-285/Ga. 400 interchange construction
The Georgia Department of Transportation is building a new I-285 eastbound ramp to Ashford Dunwoody Road. The new ramp will open Sunday. (File photo by Hyosub Shin / Hyosub.Shin@ajc.com)

Credit: HYOSUB SHIN / AJC

Credit: HYOSUB SHIN / AJC

The Georgia Department of Transportation is building a new I-285 eastbound ramp to Ashford Dunwoody Road. The new ramp will open Sunday. (File photo by Hyosub Shin / Hyosub.Shin@ajc.com)

Construction on the new I-285 interchange at Ga. 400 will reach another milestone this weekend with the opening of a new eastbound exit to Ashford Dunwoody Road from the Perimeter.

The Georgia Department of Transportation plans to open the new exit lane by 9 a.m. Sunday. Under the new configuration, eastbound motorists seeking to exit onto Ashford Dunwoody must merge onto the new ramp just past Glenridge Drive. If you miss the exit, you’ll need to exit at Chamblee Dunwoody Road, merge onto I-285 westbound and return to Ashford Dunwoody.

I-285 eastbound access to Lake Hearn Drive will be from the new ramp to Ashford Dunwoody. There will be no return access to I-285 eastbound from the new ramp.

The new Ashford Dunwoody exit lane is part of the larger reconfiguration of the I-285/Ga. 400 interchange and surrounding area. GDOT and North Perimeter Contractors are rebuilding the interchange to address one of the region’s worst traffic bottlenecks — it was designed to accommodate 100,000 vehicles a day, though more than 400,000 vehicles pass through the interchange daily.

Because of several delays, construction is expected to last until the third quarter of 2022.

Up next: The contractor will soon begin replacing three bridges along I-285. That will require GDOT to reduce the Perimeter from five lanes to three in each direction from Roswell Road to Ashford Dunwoody. The lane reduction is expected to last until next summer and lead to huge traffic jams.