TULALIP — After seven years of planning, design and construction, a newly widened two-mile stretch of Marine Drive will be dedicated Thursday with a ribbon-cutting, a blessing, speeches, singing and dancing.
Completion of the $9 million project means business should return to normal for shops along the route, which suffered because of the construction.
"Clearly, we lost a lot of money, and we lost some customers, too," said Sanghoon Lee, owner of Totem Grocery and Gas at 105 Marine Drive. "But it’s getting better."
Lee took over the grocery store five months ago in the middle of the project that widened the road between 19th Avenue NE and Seventh Drive NW.
The project included installation of a center turn lane, bicycle lanes, curbs, gutters, enclosed drainage, sidewalks, retaining walls and storm-water detention ponds. The tribe also installed streetlights along part of the way.
"It’s a beautiful road," Tulalip Tribes Chairman Herman Williams Jr. said.
Eventually, the tribe would like to see the road widened and lighted all the way to the reservation’s northern boundary, at Fire Trail Road, he said.
"This road is going to save a lot of lives and help people," he said.
Debbie and Jerry Luhr agreed. Their Marine Drive home is on the western end of the project.
"It was scary walking to the house next door before they put in the sidewalks," she said. "It’s nice to have the sidewalks for the kids when they go to the store … and so you don’t have to be looking over your shoulder and worrying about getting hit. Many parents wouldn’t let their kids walk that road."
She’s seen numerous wrecks near her home, had drunken drivers run off the road and into her yard, and a couple of years ago a young man crashed into the utility pole near her house.
"My daughter still has nightmares from that," she said. "There were always drunks walking down the road, and now there’s sidewalks so they’re less apt to get run over."
Some finishing touches remain, such as completing driveways that open onto the road and finishing sidewalks.
"They told us they would fix our driveway in about a week, but it’s been a month already," Lee said. "But I understand. We have had rain very often."
Misty Stribling works at Amy’s Espresso in the Priest Point area.
"We used to have $400 days," she said. "Sometimes (during the construction), it’s dropped by hundreds of dollars. It’s slowed down for the last eight to nine months.
"But it’s picking up," she said.
At Leota’s Cafe, 615 Marine Drive NE, business dropped by 75 percent, said owner Leota Pablo, a tribal elder whose menu includes Indian tacos and fry bread.
"It’s hardly worth making the dough and the chili," she said. "There’s no sense in it going to waste. I used to order 200 pounds of flour every two weeks, and 100 pounds of beans a month. I’m only doing one-quarter of that, if that much."
Workers helped, though, by erecting a concrete retaining wall and a fence in front of the business.
"It will improve things, especially for emergency cars," Pablo said. In the past, "we had a hard time getting off the road for the firetrucks. Everybody’s glad that it’s been done, because we needed the wider road. It was so narrow there wasn’t anyplace for people to walk."
J.P. Sorensen, who lives on a houseboat on the reservation, also is pleased with the improvements. A pilot, Sorensen said driving the road has been scarier than flying.
"This is where you need luck — driving cars," he said, nodding toward Marine Drive. "There’s been a lot of accidents. This is one of the most dangerous roads around."
Reporter Cathy Logg: 425-339-3437 or logg@heraldnet.com.
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