$4.9M in damage: Winter wrecked Snohomish County roads, bridges

Published 12:01 am Monday, April 18, 2011

A road near Stanwood will remain out of commission for the foreseeable future, adding to the lingering affects of this winter’s storms.

Miller Road joins a list of other Snohomish County roads awaiting pricey repairs, including Reiter Road near Index and the Mountain Loop Highway near Verlot.

Slides closed Miller Road in March. The road is ineligible for federal recovery money. The county hasn’t had much luck securing federal money to pay for other recent weather-related road damage, either.

Combined, storms since December have caused nearly $4.9 million in damage to Snohomish County’s road and bridges.

“It’s mostly road issues that we had and the main issue was slides,” county spokesman Christopher Schwarzen said. “It was so much saturation, the roadsides just gave way.”

The upshot is that some of the repairs might have to wait a while.

For road and bridge damage in December, the county is trying to secure $1.2 million from the Federal Emergency Management Agency and $2.8 million from the Federal Highway Administration, Schwarzen said. The county also recorded $371,000 in storm-related road and bridge damage from January and $500,000 from March.

Much of the problem owes to unusually wet weather.

March’s rainfall total for the area was 178 percent of normal, or nearly double, according to the National Weather Service in Seattle. Everett had about 7.6 inches of rain last month, compared to about 2.7 inches in March 2010.

Rainfall likely contributed to problems under the pavement on Miller Road, which connects Marine Drive and Pioneer Highway southeast of Stanwood. It’s been closed between Norman Road and Pioneer Highway since March 18.

Problems on Miller Road started last summer and heavy rains have since made things worse, Schwarzen said. Repairs are estimated to cost up to $300,000. That means they will need to compete with other county road projects.

In the eastern reaches of the county, Reiter Road’s near-term future is uncertain. Slides have kept part of two-lane road between Gold Bar and Index closed since Dec. 12. The road is mainly used to reach recreational areas.

Because the federal government denied the county’s December disaster declaration, there’s no pot of money on hand to pay to fix Reiter Road. The state is appealing the U.S. government’s decision, which also applies to other counties in Washington.

Without federal dollars, Reiter Road will remain closed, competing with Miller Road and other projects on a county priority list.

Elsewhere in the county, crews hope to finish months of work to fully reopen the Mountain Loop Highway by the end of May, Schwarzen said. A slide below the roadway had been years in the making. The blacktop finally washed out after heavy rains in January.

Since then, the road has been restricted to one lane. Repairs are expected to cost $1.7 million and wrap up by late May, Schwarzen said. The Federal Highway Administration is covering some costs.

The damage Snohomish County suffered from mid-January storms did not meet the $606,000 threshold needed to qualify for federal disaster assistance for roads and other public infrastructure, said Marvin Nauman, a spokesman for the state’s Emergency Management Division.

In the Meadowdale area north of Edmonds, county engineers also are gauging possible repairs along Norma Beach Road. Again, there is no money to pay for fixes. A mid-March mudslide heavily damaged a home in the same area.

An erosion problem alongside Index-Galena Road also could lead to the a shutdown of one lane.

Noah Haglund: 425-339-3465, nhaglund@heraldnet.com.