Hundreds of businesses and homes forced to relocate amid I-45 expansion

Interstate 45 has been a thorn in the side of the Houston commute for decades now. If you are one of the unfortunate commuters that has to go from, say The Woodlands down to the Pasadena area, you are easily looking at over an hour commute, both ways, daily. Part of that can be blamed on the aging infrastructure, and part of it on the fact the metro area has grown to over 7.5 million people.

So, amid raging complaints, the Texas Department of Transportation (TXDOT) has devised a $13 billion, expansion project for I-45, which began its first steps of construction in October. As that settles in, and TXDOT claims imminent domain on property along the freeway, it means many businesses in a bustling area of Houston are being forced to do the costly thing of relocating.

In all, 331 businesses will be displaced amid the project, including five places of worship, and over 1,200 families in various neighborhoods.

Erin Eriksen with the group Stop TXDOT I-45 says people are compensated by TXDOT in most cases, but that does not necessarily put a band aid on the problem.

"I do not know what compensation looks like for businesses...if it actually recoups the costs of picking up your business, and moving to another location," she says.

The group Stop TXDOT I-45 was launched in 2018, aimed at protecting those along the route from an expansion they see as less than profitable.

The driver (no pun intended) of this expansion project has mostly been the congestion. The surface looks logical. Expand the highway, and more cars can filter through. Again, on the surface, it seems logical. But really, it will only create more headaches.

"People will think 'oh it's a wider freeway, so I can just get on that,' so you have more people getting on the freeway," she says.

In a letter the group sent to the Hoston Chronicle, they project that between 2015 and 2040, the average daily traffic volume will increase as much as 40 percent in the project's corridor.

Mind you, that is in an area that might be the most heavily congested in all of Houston already. Factor in the fact that it took over a decade to finish the Highway 290 expansion, and there is reason to worry this will take even longer. It is a government project, after all.

But beyond just adding more headaches, and more traffic amid the construction, there is the human aspect to it. Businesses and nightlife that have been in their location for years, and revered by many, will have to uproot themselves.

"St. Emanuel is where the drainage project starts...that is a street with bustling nightlife, and a lot of businesses that people love dearly, and those are going to be gone," she says. "It is going to completely strip that area of the community they have had."

TXDOT says the aim of the project is to enhance safety, which would be a positive. I-45 is one of the deadliest roadways in the state. But the cost of it is going to be great, and not just in the pocketbooks.

The project is projected to take 10 years to complete.