MILL CREEK — Penny Creek no longer travels through three undersized pipes beneath Mill Creek Road.
A new, $1.5 million bridge over the creek was recently finished. Only minor work — such as landscaping and the addition of handrails — remains to be done in the coming weeks.
Until last month, construction of the 24-foot bridge had caused traffic delays on Mill Creek Road since late April.
The bridge was necessary because the culverts that once carried the creek beneath the road were beginning to deteriorate. The fill material beneath the road was falling into the pipes and washing away in the creek, Mill Creek Assistant City Engineer Scott Smith said.
Worst-case scenario, the road would have eventually collapsed, he said.
Q: How bad were the culverts?
Smith: “They were very bad. It was getting to be an urgent project. We’d done some temporary repairs to bandage it along for a couple years, but we knew it was a high-priority project to get working on.”
Q: Why not just continue to fix the culverts?
Smith: “We couldn’t really fix it, and the most cost-effective alternative while meeting environmental requirements was to build a new bridge.”
Q: How did the city pay for the bridge?
Smith: The city took out a low-interest loan from the state to pay for the project, and is using surface water utility fees to repay the loan. Surface water utility fees are an annual fee that everyone in the city pays.
Q: What are the environmental benefits to having a bridge instead of culverts?
Smith: “It’s much more of a natural stream channel now, and much more fish-friendly and fish-passable.”
Q: What was the most difficult part of building the bridge?
Smith: “We had to bypass the creek around the project site. We put in a big underground pipe and diverted the creek into the pipe and ran it around the job site for about four months.”
Q: What kind of fish can be found in Penny Creek?
Smith: “Mostly cutthroat trout and Coho salmon.”
Q: How long is the new bridge expected to last?
Smith: “I don’t want to say indefinitely, but it’s got a good 50-year lifespan or so on it.”
Reporter Scott Pesznecker: 425-339-3436 or spesznecker@heraldnet.com.
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