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Construction begins Wednesday on the dual roundabout interchange that is being installed along U.S. 62 at the U.S. 31W Bypass in Elizabethtown.

According to Kentucky Transportation Cabinet District Four, the ramp from the U.S. 31W Bypass southbound to U.S. 62 along with the southbound U.S. 62 ramp onto the bypass will be closed, with traffic on U.S. 62 moving to one lane in each direction in the vicinity of the interchange.

The interchange work was announced in 2024 as one piece of improvements aimed at making U.S. 62 safer and more efficient.

“Reworking those entrances and exits on U.S. 62 at the bypass is really a bigger piece of this entire corridor project that expands from the bypass area over to French Street on the other side of 31W near downtown,” said KYTC District Four Public Information Officer Chris Jessie. “This whole corridor gets resurfaced ultimately. There’s striping changes that we made a few months back, and we’ve monitored those. There’ll be some tweaking to those, and that’s why we did those early before we put pavement down, so we don’t put down pavement and then have to redo everything, so it was done in stages for reasons.”

Two detours are in place during construction. For U.S. 31W Bypass southbound to U.S. 62, traffic will continue south on the bypass to New Glendale Road and reverse direction onto the bypass northbound to U.S. 62. For U.S. 62 to U.S. 31W Bypass southbound, traffic will continue west to Ring Road, then turn right onto Ring Road to Patriot Parkway, then turn right onto Patriot Parkway and continue onto the southbound bypass ramp.

Work is scheduled to be completed on the interchange roundabouts by November 1. Several traffic pattern changes will occur during construction. Follow KYTC District Four on social media for updates.

An Elizabethtown summertime staple is coming up this week as the annual Cruisin’ the Heartland Festival takes to the streets.

“We kick it off on Thursday, July 24, with a movie at the State Theater,” said City of Elizabethtown Events Manager Beth Pyles. “This year we will be showing Smokey and the Bandit, which is a fantastic, classic car movie. I mean, everyone remembers the Trans Ams with the t-tops.”

The box office opens at 6 p.m. on Thursday and tickets, which include popcorn and a drink, are $5.

The Cruisin’ the Heartland Car Show will be held at Freeman Lake Park on Friday.

“That event starts at 2 p.m.,” Pyles said. “We will have registration. You can bring your car out and get it judged and be part of the car show, but you don’t have to have a car to come to that.”

The free Cruisin’ Car Show Concert, featuring The Checkmates, will begin at the Freeman Lake Park bandstand at 4 p.m. Friday.

Downtown streets will close for Saturday festivities beginning at 6 a.m. The swap meet area and breakfast at the Historic State Theater open at 8. Events on the State Theater parking lot stage begin at 11 a.m. with the Quicksie Watermelon Eating Contest.

“We’ll also have Aaron Hart’s magic show later in the day,” Pyles said. “We’ll have a Not-So Newlywed Game show, classic trivia, and then our concert this year features Carabou, which is a Louisville-based band and they play all the hits from the years gone by, so we’re excited about that.”

Visit www.etownevents.com for a full schedule of events and activities.

The Kentucky Transportation Cabinet is warning residents that a scam involving phony texts posing as the cabinet has not gone away. 

The KYTC says the scam messages warn customers of unpaid traffic tickets and say that a “DMV violation” will be reported and “driving privileges” will be suspended if payment is not sent immediately. The text includes a link that is formatted to look similar to Kentucky government website addresses.

The KYTC is still working on having fraudulent websites related to the scam taken down. In the meantime, the cabinet is reminding residents that they do not collect traffic ticket fines or notify customers of violations via text. If you see text messages using phrases such as “KDOT” or “DMV” they are not from the KYTC, and be wary of links made to look like the KYTC’s website drive.ky.gov.

If you receive a suspicious text message, never click the link. If you did or provided personal or financial information, contact your bank immediately. You can report the text to the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center at ic3.gov, or you can report it to the Kentucky Attorney General’s Office at ag.ky.gov.