After what wil be more than 906 days of closure and more than $100 million spent to repair it the West Seattle Bridge will finally reopen the week of September 12 SDOT said today.
In a meeting with the Community Task Force that came together a few months after the closure Bridge Program Director Heather Marx said, "Testing, weather, worker availability and supply chain issues" and other matters may affect the actual date. The final date will be announced 30 days prior.
Pending successful completion of remaining construction tasks, West Seattle Bridge will reopen in September 2022
"The Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) announced today that the West Seattle Bridge is scheduled to reopen as soon as the week of September 12, 2022.
“We expect the West Seattle Bridge to be open to traffic during the week of September 12. Sharing that today is a relief since our focus has always been on safely getting everyone back on the bridge ASAP. It’s been hard having to wait for this update, but we did need to get through the concrete work to understand exactly where we were schedule-wise. Thank you for being so patient, Seattle,” SDOT Program Manager Heather Marx said.
The disruptions caused by the regional concrete strike have had an ongoing impact on the project schedule. SDOT’s construction contractor originally planned to begin pouring concrete at the beginning of the year, but ultimately had to wait until mid-April to start pouring the structural concrete, which is essential to strengthening the bridge. Today’s announced schedule shift is about equal in length to the extra time spent waiting for concrete to arrive.
During the concrete strike, SDOT adjusted the sequence of work activities to minimize delays and keep the project moving forward in other ways. Crews never stopped working to repair and strengthen the bridge, and continued working on epoxy injections and carbon fiber wrapping during the wait for concrete.
Specialized structural concrete is an essential part of the plan to strengthen the bridge. Crews finished pouring structural concrete on May 26, 2022 and it takes 28 days for the concrete to fully harden and become strong enough to hold the 20 million pounds of force associated with the new post-tensioning system. Crews are currently in the process of installing ducts and threading steel cables through the concrete blocks, but must wait for the concrete to finish hardening before they can tighten these cables to strengthen the bridge and prevent future cracking.
Since the final structural concrete pour was completed, SDOT has worked with the construction contractor to finalize the sequence of the remaining work. SDOT will continue to hold its construction contractor accountable to meet their updated timeframe.
Remaining repairs for completion of the project require challenging and complex work. SDOT released a tentative schedule today in the interest of transparency, and stressed that a project of this scale may still encounter additional unforeseen challenges outside the City’s control. SDOT will continue to provide ongoing construction updates and notify the public if the schedule changes.
“We know that all of West Seattle, South Park, and Georgetown have had the bridge reopening top of mind since it closed. I am still holding out hope for a summer re-opening, but I appreciate SDOT’s announcement today; it lets us know that we’re close – just three months away,” City Councilmember Lisa Herbold said.
The bridge closed in 2020 when bridge inspectors saw cracks growing rapidly on the 40-year-old structure linking West Seattle to the rest of the city across the Duwamish Waterway. SDOT completed emergency repairs in 2020 to prevent further cracking and keep the public safe. In 2021, SDOT designed and began final repairs to strengthen the bridge to safely withstand the weight and stress of daily traffic.
Final repairs to the bridge include three key repair procedures: epoxy injections to fill cracks, carbon- fiber wrapping to add strength, and post-tensioning with steel cables to compress the concrete. Together, these methods will rehabilitate the entire structure, prevent future cracking, and help keep the bridge safe for decades to come.
Throughout the repair processes, SDOT put the West Seattle, South Park, and Georgetown communities front and center in its planning and outreach. Staff worked to expedite bridge repairs to West Seattle, calm traffic, and make neighborhood streets safer in Highland Park and the Duwamish Valley, where bridge traffic detoured through communities and business districts.
“Our Community Task force we set up has brought a thoughtful, people-driven perspective to a major piece of infrastructure repair. We appreciate transparency from the City through all this process. In the next few months, I’m expecting to see more neighborhood-level safety work and support for our community members and small businesses. It’ll be a great day when we get through the work and come together to commemorate reopening,” Task Force Co-chair Paulina Lopez said.
“I speak for all when I say that we wish the bridge could open safely, sooner. But we now have a date and can begin planning our lives around it. Our task force has labored for two years to get us to this point and we have made a difference. Thank you to all community members and staff for your effort and persistence!,” former City of Seattle Mayor and Task Force Co-chair Greg Nickels said.
After the post-tensioning is complete, crews will complete a final round of epoxy crack injections and carbon-fiber wrapping. They will also complete other work to prepare the bridge for reopening to traffic. This work includes replacing expansion joints, restoring the road by closing crew access holes, replacing overhead signs, replacing concrete panels east of 35th Ave SW, installing a concrete overlay on the Fauntleroy Expressway, and removing detours and adjusting traffic signals in West Seattle.
“I’m relieved we finally have a safe and certain reopening date, and I know it's disappointing to many that the concrete strike delays could not be overcome,” said Councilmember Alex Pedersen, Chair of the City Council’s Transportation Committee."
