Street Smarts: That I-5 shortcut’s tempting, but illegal

Published 10:58 pm Sunday, March 9, 2008

There’s a tempting chunk of pavement that just popped up in the middle of I-5 in Everett.

It looks like a cross between a mountain trail switchback and the steepest street in San Francisco.

A driver swimming in the evening sea of brake lights between the Boeing Freeway and the Broadway exit might see it as an escape valve. “I’ll just pull in here, and head south to Everett Mall for a drink or a pit stop.”

Stick to the lanes, troopers say. The road is an S-shaped emergency turnaround for the State Patrol, the highway department and aid cars.

“It could be tempting, but the chance of getting caught might be pretty darn good,” trooper Keith Leary said.

The fine for driving on the shortcut road starts at $124 and could jump another $550 if a driver pulls in front of other traffic, Leary said.

“It’s pretty tight, very tight,” Leary said. “Unlike conventional turnarounds that you can take at 15 mph, this one you have to be very, very careful due to the S-turn.”

Troopers and aid cars will be able to get to accidents more quickly using the turnaround, Leary said. The road will also be used by state crews who help with stalled cars.

“It’s not open to the public, it’s open to official vehicles,” said Connie Lewis, spokeswoman for the Everett I-5 HOV lane project. “Don’t be tempted, folks.”

Stripe tease

Question: The state’s recent intersection improvements at 108th Street NE (in Marysville north of Getchell) have subpar line striping. At night it is real hard to see where the lines are. The lines are not as wide or bright as the original lines before and after the intersection. Also the reflective bumps were not put in like the original.

The ones there now are little, flag-like, temporary looking, and do not show up. When the road is wet at night, the temporary construction lines, which have been ground off, shine and mislead as to where the actual lane is taking you. The quality of the widening is excellent and the surface is perfectly smooth.

David Nelson, Marysville

Answer: Crews opened the new and improved intersection at Highway 9 and Lauck Road and 108th Street in August with temporary striping. With good weather last week, most of the permanent, reflective plastic striping was installed by the state’s busy striping crew.

Plastic striping will be more reflective than the old striping because it contains glass beads to increase the reflectivity and visibility of the striping. The plastic stripe is thicker, with raised sections, replacing the old reflective bumps and the temporary flag-like plastic bumps the reader mentions.

We are using this new type of plastic striping, in combination with raised reflective markers, as part of our stripe maintenance program and in our new construction projects on interstate highways. The plastic striping is more costly but is more durable than traditional paint and is much more reflective. In addition to better reflective striping, crews installed four new overhead lamps at this intersection to improve nighttime lighting. When crews re-stripe a roadway with permanent striping they remove the temporary striping and construction lines.

Marlin Lenssen, WSDOT Snohomish area traffic engineer

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Have a question about traffic or street rules around Snohomish and Island counties? We can help find an answer. E-mail Street Smarts at stsmarts@heraldnet.com.