PIERRE - The state Transportation Commission added nine surfacing projects to South Dakota's 2015 highway-work plan Friday.
They previously were set for 2016 or after.
State Department of Transportation officials recommended the work be done sooner, based on results from inspections this fall.
Commissioner Don Roby of Watertown said the additions would cost a total of $26.7 million.
He and the other eight commissioners were told the 2015 budget could handle it.
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"We really want to capitalize on the funds we have in our surfacing category," said Joel Jundt, director for DOT's Division of Planning and Engineering.
Doing the work in 2015 would allow DOT to obligate all of its federal funding so that South Dakota could become eligible for more federal aid in late summer 2015, according to Jundt.
He said the goal is to ensure those highways' surfaces don't deteriorate beyond what DOT wants to maintain.
The resurfacing projects are:
• S.D. 50 eastbound from Yankton County line east to end of divided highway;
• S.D. 46 from S.D. 25 to east of Bon Homme and Yankton counties line;
• U.S. 12 from nine miles west of McIntosh to McIntosh;
• U.S. 14 from east of Wessington to the north U.S. 281 junction;
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• U.S. 281 from the Jerauld and Beadle counties line to the south U.S. 281 junction;
• U.S. 281 near the railroad overhead near Tulare;
• U.S. 14 from Highmore to Miller;
• S.D. 10 from east of the Marshall and Roberts counties line to Sisseton; and
• S.D. 45 from Miller's south city edge to the south U.S. 14 junction.
The board also agreed to delay three ramp detour projects on Interstate 29 in Roberts County from 2015 to 2017.
