SR 39 closed 45 days east of Loudonville for bridge work

State Route 39 was closed east of Loudonville for 45 days between Township Road 455 and Banks Road, turning a routine county drive into a longer detour for commuters, farm traffic and service calls moving through this part of Holmes County.

The Ohio Department of Transportation routed drivers around the work zone by way of SR 3 north, SR 226 east and SR 179 south before returning to SR 39, with the reverse path used for traffic heading the other direction. ODOT said the work was weather permitting and gave the overall project a completion date of Oct. 31, 2026.

The project, listed as Project ID 115928, was budgeted at $590,000 and classified as bridge preservation. ODOT said the job will replace the existing bridge over Small Run with a box culvert, reshape the existing channel and widen the graded shoulder area. The original notice for the project said construction would begin in spring 2026 and finish in fall 2026, and it also said access to the city pool would be maintained during construction. The new closure update superseded that traffic plan with a full shutdown at the work site.

For Holmes County, where roads connect small villages, farms and regional destinations across a large rural landscape, even a short closure can have outsized effects on daily travel. The county had a population of 44,223 in the 2020 Census, and Loudonville, the nearest village to the work zone, had 2,786 residents in 2020. Loudonville sits in both Ashland and Holmes counties and serves as a gateway to the Mohican area, which makes the SR 39 corridor important well beyond the immediate bridge site.

ODOT pointed drivers to OHGO and ODOT District 11’s social channels for the latest travel information. OHGO is the state’s real-time traffic and road-status service, updated by ODOT traffic operators, and it tracks construction, incidents, events and closures across Ohio. With multiple road projects showing up on ODOT’s Holmes County construction page, the SR 39 closure became part of a broader season of maintenance and detours that will keep requiring extra time and careful route planning across the county.