KELO: Major changes coming to Minnesota Avenue-I-229

https://www.keloland.com/news/local-news/major-changes-coming-to-minnesota-avenue-i-229/ 

by: Anya Joseph

Posted: Feb 11, 2026 / 05:32 PM CST

Updated: Feb 12, 2026 / 12:00 PM CST

SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (KELO) — The I-229 interchange reconstruction project in Sioux Falls continues on to Minnesota Avenue. A temporary road closure caused a snag in traffic Wednesday morning.

Early Wednesday morning drivers may have had to make a detour onto I-229 because of a road closure on South Minnesota Avenue. Construction crews were installing a temporary bridge as a part of the I-229 interchange reconstruction project.

For the DOT, there was no such thing as too many precautions.

“The contractor will probably use a a loader to kind of launch the bridge across Minnesota and the closure is just more for safety purposes. That way, we don’t have vehicles driving underneath it and not that anything could go wrong, but we just want to take as much precautions as we can,” engineering supervisor for South Dakota DOT Kirk Henderson said.

The temporary closing lasted about two hours, starting at 9:30, with crews only putting up the structure of the temporary bridge. Now, traffic at South Minnesota Avenue near I-229 has resumed back to normal.

For the owner of Taylor’s Pantry, Nicole Dahm, she says the closure disrupted her commute to work.

“So it probably added about ten minutes,” Dahm said. “There were several people that had to wait on that Cliff Avenue exit for about ten minutes, it was three light changes I know that, before all of us could get through.”

Dahm hopes the project could help with the chaos of rush hour when it is finished.

“Honestly, when I leave work, I try to never hit that 4:30 p.m. to 5:30 pm. window because it’s always very congested to the point where this intersection, you can’t even get on to Minnesota a lot of times, even though the light has changed.”

“there’s a lot of traffic that goes on Minnesota Avenue with all the different businesses and it’s an easy expressway to get onto on the 229. It’s just kind of towards the end of it service life and we’re adding more lanes to help with capacity,” Henderson said.

Henderson says the temporary bridge will not be open to traffic until the Minnesota Avenue Interchange project begins which is set for 2027.