A scaled-down version of the U.S. Route 460 bypass project in Virginia has been approved for construction by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. It’s now up to state officials to decide whether the 16- mile highway, estimated to cost $425 million, should be built. The project would create a new four-lane divided highway. It originally began in 2012 as a privately developed $1.8-billion, 55-mile tolled freeway, designed primarily to facilitate heavy truck traffic between Virginia’s ports and the I-95/85 corridor. Slow progress, due to the design-build team’s inability to adequately mitigate impacts on an estimated 600 acres of wetlands, spawned scrutiny about the contract’s payment structure, as well as the need for the project itself. The contract was canceled in April 2015. Less than 40 acres of wetlands are to be disrupted by the scaled-down proposal, which will now be ranked for funding priority by the Virginia Dept. of Transportation.