After 909 days the West Seattle Bridge is at long last open. It came as a bit of surprise since Seattle Department of Transportation staffers had said for weeks that it would open on Sunday Sept. 18. 

But at 9:07 after some last minute street sweeping to clean up a bit of debris, SDOT crews took down the barriers and the road was clear.

Standing by near his Triumph motorcycle, Matt Swallwell, was ready and squeezed past two SDOT trucks to be the very first driver on the bridge. He was soon followed by other drivers who honked in celebration many of them clearly elated to be back on the newly repaired bridge.

SDOT crews were also out, taking down the detour signs and removing signage about restrictions on the lower swing bridge which is now open again. 

Nine King County Metro bus routes will shift back to the West Seattle Bridge on Monday: routes 21/21X, 50, 55, 56, 57, 120, 125, and the RapidRide C Line. Metro expects the use of the high bridge to reduce travel time and improve reliability for riders between West Seattle and downtown Seattle.

The repairs to the West Seattle Bridge included nearly 60 miles of steel cables post-tensioned to form the new backbone of the bridge. Each of the cables was anchored into new specialized concrete blocks woven into the bridge and capable of holding more than 20 million pounds of force.

The new post-tensioning system works in tandem with other repairs to the bridge, including an extensive network of more than 100,000 square feet of reinforced carbon fiber sheets wrapped inside and outside the bridge walls and over 240 gallons of epoxy injected into cracked concrete.

These repair systems have prepared the bridge to handle the weight of vehicles and decades of seasonal temperature changes. With these repairs complete, the bridge is much stronger than it was before and will last for decades to come.

Recent tests demonstrated that the repairs were performing as expected and the bridge was strong enough to support the thousands of vehicles expected to cross it each day. SDOT’s engineers and bridge specialists will continue to closely monitor the bridge using cameras, sensors, and frequent in-person inspections.

During the repair process, crews installed permanent inspection platforms inside the bridge’s girders that will allow inspectors to examine the structure’s concrete easily. Crews also widened the left shoulder of the westbound lanes so that bridge inspectors can get inside the structure for frequent inspections without having to close a traffic lane.

In addition to repair work, SDOT took advantage of the closure to complete other kinds of bridge maintenance work. This work included replacing old expansion joints and sign structures, pouring a new concrete overlay on the Fauntleroy Expressway to the west of the bridge, and repouring worn concrete panels on the bridge’s western approach.