Lake Shore Drive runs 2.35 miles through Long Beach, Indiana, from Stop 13 to Stop 31, and the asphalt on top has not been fully resurfaced since roughly 1995. Underneath that asphalt sits a buried layer of reinforced concrete pavement, original to an even earlier construction era, whose joints and cracks have been telegraphing up through the surface for years. The town's own engineering consultant, Haas & Associates, put it plainly in its 2026 evaluation: the road's distress mirrors the slab beneath it, and resurfacing alone will not fix that for long.
That is the official reason Long Beach is now moving, carefully and slowly, toward a paving project. But read past the pavement condition and the report says something more interesting, and more relevant to anyone who owns property along that corridor. Fixing the road means first figuring out where the road is actually supposed to be, because in places it has drifted off center inside its own right-of-way. The reason for that drift, according to the engineers, is private property encroachment that has accumulated over decades.
Three Decades Between Resurfacings
A road that hasn't been touched structurally since the mid-1990s tends to collect small accommodations. A driveway apron poured a foot wider than it should have been. A retaining wall built to the edge of the pavement instead of the edge of the parcel. A hedge or a fence line that shifted a little with each replacement. None of it looks like a problem day to day. It only becomes a problem when someone with a survey and a construction budget needs to know exactly where the travel lanes are allowed to sit.
That is where Long Beach is now. The town's project page describes the current phase as preliminary engineering and design, meaning nothing about the final road width or alignment is locked in yet. What is locked in is the scope: Haas & Associates is evaluating options to bring Lake Shore Drive to a uniform 12-foot lane width on each side, 24 feet of paved surface total, and to correct the places where the existing roadway has migrated away from the center of its right-of-way.
Why the State Grant Turns One Project Into Several
The timeline for this work is not being set by construction logistics alone. It's being set by how Indiana pays for it.
Long Beach is funding the project through the state's Community Crossings Matching Grant Program, which covers 80 percent of a qualifying project's cost with the town covering the remaining 20 percent. The program caps its state award at roughly $1 million per grant cycle, which puts a ceiling of about $1.25 million in total project spending, state and local combined, on any given year's application. The engineering evaluation is direct about what that means here: because the full Lake Shore Drive project will cost more than that ceiling, completion will likely require between two and four separate grant cycles.
In practical terms, that rules out a single construction season. The Long Beach Town Council approved final engineering for Phase 1 on May 11, 2026, and authorized staff to pursue a Community Crossings grant, with an application deadline of July 31. The town's project page lists construction as possible in fall 2026 or spring 2027, depending on how that funding cycle lands, and explicitly notes that later phases will need their own engineering and their own grant applications, brought back to the council separately.
If you own along this stretch or are weighing an offer on a house that fronts it, the honest expectation to set is not "the road gets fixed this year." It's a rolling, multi-year project, one phase at a time, each one dependent on the next round of state funding coming through.
The Line in the Report That Matters More Than the Paving
Buried in the technical language of the evaluation is the sentence that actually changes how a property owner should read this project. The engineers note that in many locations the existing roadway is generally centered within the right-of-way, but in other locations it deviates, often due to private property encroachments that have accumulated over decades, some close enough to the travel lanes to reduce available clearance.
That is a careful way of saying that somewhere along those 2.35 miles, driveways, walls, or landscaping that homeowners have treated as their own for years may in fact sit partly on town right-of-way, and the realignment work now on the table could require some of it to move. The report is also clear that the current options are not a cosmetic upgrade. Curbs, gutters, sidewalks, street lighting, and pedestrian furnishings are explicitly outside the scope of this phase. The scope centers on structural repair and roadway alignment.
What This Means If You're Selling on This Corridor
If your property fronts Lake Shore Drive between Stop 13 and Stop 31, the paving project is worth raising in a listing conversation before a buyer's inspector or surveyor raises it first. A few practical steps make that conversation easier:
- Pull your parcel survey, if you have one, and compare it against the town's current right-of-way lines before you list.
- Note whether any driveway apron, retaining wall, or fence sits close to the pavement edge. If it does, it's worth understanding whether that structure falls inside the town's right-of-way rather than assuming it doesn't.
- Expect buyer questions about construction timing. With Phase 1 barely through final engineering as of mid-2026, and the town openly stating that further phases depend on future grant cycles, there is no firm end date to promise anyone.
None of this is a reason to delay a sale. It is a reason to have the answers ready rather than reactive.
What This Means If You're Buying
A buyer evaluating a home on Lake Shore Drive is really evaluating two things: the house, and its relationship to a right-of-way that is actively being surveyed and may be adjusted. A boundary or encroachment question that would otherwise sit dormant for years could surface sooner here, simply because the town is doing the measuring work now as part of its own project. That is worth a direct question to the seller or their agent: has the town's engineering evaluation identified anything specific about this parcel's frontage, and is there a copy of the current survey available.
It's also worth asking about phasing. A house closer to Stop 13 may see construction activity on a different schedule than one near Stop 31, since the town has confirmed later segments will need their own engineering and their own grant cycle. That difference in timing can matter if you're weighing a summer purchase against the prospect of construction equipment on the street the following year.
One More Wrinkle: The Address That Isn't Only Yours
A Citizen Portal report says Long Beach and neighboring Michigan City both have a Lake Shore Drive, and the two towns share overlapping address numbers along it. County dispatch has handled this for some time by attaching an "MC" or "LB" suffix to route emergency calls correctly, and Long Beach Council member Anita Remijas raised the issue again with the town's police chief in May 2026 to confirm the workaround was still holding. Nothing about that arrangement is expected to change soon, but it's a detail worth knowing before you assume a Lake Shore Drive address maps cleanly to a single town, particularly if you're pulling records, mail history, or service registrations tied to the address.
FAQ
Is the Lake Shore Drive project going to widen the road significantly? The current engineering options aim for a uniform 24 feet of paved surface, 12 feet per lane, in sections that don't already meet that width. It's a functional correction, not a major expansion, and the town has stated the scope excludes new curbs, sidewalks, or lighting.
When will construction actually start? As of the town's most recent project update, construction could begin in fall 2026 or spring 2027, depending on whether the Phase 1 Community Crossings grant application is approved and how design and permitting proceed from there.
Does this affect every property on Lake Shore Drive equally? No. The encroachment and realignment issues the engineers flagged are described as occurring in some locations, not uniformly across the corridor, and the project is being built out in phases rather than all at once.
If you own property along Lake Shore Drive, or you're looking at one, it's worth a conversation about what the town's current survey and engineering work actually mean for your specific parcel before you list or make an offer. Mark Hull has spent two decades on the construction side of exactly these questions, and offers a complimentary consultation for anyone who wants a straight answer before they're standing in front of a surveyor's stakes.
This article is general information, not legal, tax or financial advice. Consult a qualified professional about your situation.
