Tacoma drivers face another delay to I-5 HOV project
Oct 26, 2021, 4:29 PM | Updated: 5:23 pm
Crews installing pipe as part of a storm drainage system at the Port of Tacoma Road on-ramp to southbound I-5 last summer. (Photo courtesy of WSDOT Blog)
(Photo courtesy of WSDOT Blog)
The I-5 HOV project in Tacoma and the new southbound Puyallup River Bridge that were supposed to be finished by the end of the year will not be complete until next summer.
“The contractor had a very ambitious goal,” Cara Mitchell with the Washington State Department of Transportation told KIRO Radio. “When they realized that they weren’t going to make it, then we thought, OK, we need to come clean, rip the Band-Aid off, and tell folks. We have a few more months of this.”
Mitchell says the contractor ran into some supply chain issues and difficulties with worker availability, but it was recent bad weather that forced them to make the difficult call.
Drivers will remain in the temporary freeway configuration until all the work is complete.
Work on the L Street overpass and the T Street drainage will continue, but all the paving will have to wait until next year.
