Night work to close I-5
Published 9:00 pm Tuesday, August 15, 2006
EVERETT – Starting Monday, I-5 will be shut down completely for two nights – maybe three – so a new 41st Street SE bridge can be dropped into place one girder at a time.
Twenty-five 82-ton concrete girders will be placed on footings. Once they’re all bolted in, work crews will then start putting down the road surface that will become a new bridge.
The work is part of the state Department of Transportation’s $260 million I-5 widening project for north Everett.
“It’s probably the largest closure we have simply because we’re closing down both directions,” said Mike Cotten, project director for the state Department of Transportation’s Everett I-5 widening project.
The new bridge is on schedule to open by Thanksgiving, only six months after construction started.
A second closure, currently set for Sept. 6-8, will be needed to finish the project, he said. An additional night might be added to the end of the September closure.
During the closures, traffic will be detoured onto the 41st Street exit ramps without northbound or southbound traffic mingling, which will keep drivers moving.
“This is about as clean as we can get,” Cotten said.
The new bridge is being built in just six months because the city of Everett and the Lowell neighborhood agreed to allow the state to rip out the bridge all at once rather than keep part of it open during construction.
When done, the new bridge will be wider than it is long, the product of having all the exit ramps come in at angles to meet up at just one traffic light – a newer bridge design that gets traffic through an intersection quicker.
The I-5 widening project is halfway done and is on schedule to finish in 2008.
It will add carpool and all-purpose lanes between Highway 526 and U.S. 2. The project also includes the new right-lane, elevated exit from northbound I-5 to Broadway.
Although the new bridge will open by Thanksgiving, work will continue at 41st Street well after that because the entire interchange is being rebuilt.
