Picture the bottom of the bluff near the St. Joseph River, where storm water from the hill drains out by the Morrison Channel. Sometime around June 2027, a crew will start there with what MDOT's project engineer says may need only a lane closure. They'll lay new storm sewer from the river outlet "near the jail" up to the top of the hill, and the rest of the M-63 rebuild follows from that first trench.
The project covers M-63 from Central Avenue to the Blossomland Bridge, plus Ship and Port streets from Main to the Bicentennial Bridge. A short stretch of Niles Avenue between Winchester Avenue and Main is also included. MDOT's project page puts the estimated construction cost at $19.8 million. Much of the coverage so far has asked when Main Street closes. A more useful question for anyone who drives it every day is which part of Main closes in which season. MDOT built the answer around protecting downtown's summer, so the summer construction lands somewhere else.
Why the work starts at the river
Rebuilding the street means replacing what's under it: storm sewer, water main and sanitary sewer, plus the pavement, curbs, sidewalks, ramps and signals on top. Storm water runs downhill, so the new storm line has to be built from the outlet up. MDOT described it to city commissioners on September 28 as building "from the river at the Morrison Channel up to the top of the bluff."
The project also uses a different contracting method. MDOT usually finishes a design, puts it out to bid and takes the low bidder. For this job it used construction manager/general contractor delivery, which brought a contractor in while the design was still underway. In the September briefing, the project engineer said MDOT hadn't done one of these "in recent memory." The last one was years ago in Traverse City. He said the reason was the job itself: very deep utilities, very old buildings along the street, and gas, power and telecom lines packed underground. The contractor has helped shape the schedule from the start, and the schedule is the part residents will feel.
The six stages, from the river south
The first visible activity may come sooner than most people expect. MDOT said tree clearing could start at the end of this coming winter, a few months from now, ahead of the 2027 work. The storm sewer work runs June through September 2027. MDOT says major road work with closures won't start until after Labor Day 2027. After that, MDOT's September 11 project StoryMap lays out six stages:
| Stage | Where | When |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Ship Street, Main Street to the Bicentennial Bridge | Fall 2027 |
| 2 | Port Street, Main to the Bicentennial Bridge; Main Street, Ship to the Blossomland Bridge | Late fall 2027 through winter 2027–28 |
| 3 | Main Street, Elm to Ship | Winter 2027–28 through spring 2028 |
| 4 | Main Street, Price to Elm | Spring through summer 2028 |
| 5 | Main Street, Central Avenue to Price | Early summer through fall 2028 |
| 6 | Niles Avenue, Winchester to Main | Fall 2028 |
MDOT calls these dates approximate and says weather and field conditions can shift them. The contractor plans to keep working through the 2027–28 winter, and how much gets done will depend on whether that winter is mild or severe.
Downtown gets the winter, and the south end of Main gets the summer
The StoryMap splits Main Street into two parts. Elm Street to the Blossomland Bridge is "the more commercial northern portion." Central Avenue to Elm is "the more residential southern portion." The schedule follows that line exactly. At the June 17 open house, held at the Maud Preston Palenske Memorial Library, MDOT said it intends to finish all of Main Street from Elm to the river, along with Port and Ship streets, before Memorial Day 2028.
City Manager Emily Hackworth called that schedule "very welcome news." She said there was "a lot of concern about what impact this will have on the city, specifically in the summer, specifically in the downtown area." Downtown St. Joseph will go through summer 2027 with storm sewer work but no full road closures. By summer 2028, the plan has its section of Main rebuilt.
The summer 2028 work still has to go somewhere, and on this schedule it moves south. Price to Elm runs from spring into summer 2028. Central Avenue to Price picks up in early summer and runs into fall. The Niles Avenue segment from Winchester to Main comes last, in fall 2028. If you live along the southern part of Main, or use it to get downtown, your construction season is the summer of 2028, a full year after downtown's crews start in fall 2027.
During construction, MDOT says access to businesses and homes will be maintained. MDOT engineer Maria Mumm said local drivers will be able to get "pretty much wherever you need to" on local streets. She also said some sections of Main will be fully closed, depending on the stage. Commercial traffic will follow a longer detour. Coming north into town, the commercial detour runs across Hilltop Road, north on M-63, east on Napier Avenue and north on M-139, then returns to Main Street in Benton Harbor and crosses into St. Joseph on the Bicentennial Bridge.
What the street looks like when the crews leave
Hackworth said resident surveys found pedestrian access was the top concern for the design. That survey ran from January 16 to February 16, 2024, and drew 875 responses. MDOT then held five public open houses, the last on June 17, 2026. The finished plan shows the influence of those surveys:
- Crossings. Every pedestrian crossing on Main will be either at a signalized intersection or at a refuge island where people can stop halfway. Only the Jones Street crossing goes away.
- Ship and Port. Both streets change from one-way to two-way traffic. Ship becomes the larger thoroughfare, and Port gets easier to reach. Ship Street gets an eastbound bike lane and Port Street a westbound one, with new traffic and pedestrian signals.
- The downtown blocks. Between Elm and the Blossomland Bridge, the plan includes median islands, decorative concrete pavement, decorative streetlights and streetscape furnishings. On-street parking is listed on the north side of Pleasant Street and the south side of Broad Street, both east of Main.
- Planting. The northern Main Street medians get evergreen shrubs, perennial grasses and flower beds, with trees along the pedestrian areas. Ship and Port get trees between the curb and sidewalk and on two of the medians, plus planted detention basins.
- Turn lanes. Berrien County asked for changes, so MDOT moved some left-turn lanes near the County Administration Building to keep access to that property closer to how it works today.
What hasn't been decided yet
There are still some gaps. MDOT's 2024 contractor-selection notice deliberately leaves out the firm's name, and none of the material reviewed for this post names it. Earlier Herald-Palladium coverage reported concern about losing 37 parking spaces on Main Street. The current StoryMap lists where on-street parking stays but doesn't give a final net count, so that earlier number may be out of date. The published material also doesn't say how traffic over the Blossomland Bridge will be handled at each stage. The named commercial detour uses the Bicentennial Bridge.
The dates most likely to change are in the middle of the schedule. Stage 3, Elm to Ship, is scheduled for winter into spring 2028. If that winter is hard, the Memorial Day target for the downtown blocks gets tight, and everything south of Elm could slide later into 2028. The MDOT project StoryMap, last updated September 11, 2026, will have any revised stage dates first.
If you own a home along the southern half of Main or near Niles Avenue and are thinking about the timing of a sale or a move before summer 2028, Joy Schwarting can go over the stage calendar with you and help you plan around it. Schedule a Consultation when you're ready.
