West Seattle Bridge opening delayed another two months

West Seattle residents are going to have to wait until September before the high bridge reopens.

The scheduled early summer reopening has been pushed back more than two months because of the King County concrete strike earlier this year.  The contractor had planned to pour the concrete for the steel support beams inside the bridge at the start of the year.  Seattle Mayor Bruce Harrell set a February 20 deadline for the strike to end before the reopening would be impacted.  The concrete didn’t arrive until mid-April.

There had been hope that the contractor could make up the time and keep the schedule somewhat intact, but that didn’t happen.  The two-month delay in getting the concrete after that deadline turned into a two-month delay in the reopening.

Work on the bridge was scheduled to end in June, and then open to traffic after a few days of load testing to make sure the bridge was ready for cars.

“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,” SDOT Program Manager Heather Marx said in a statement.  The earliest the bridge will reopen is September 12.

It’s also possible that the date could slide as well.  The remaining repair work is difficult.  “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 in a statement.”

The bridge closed to traffic in March of 2020 after cracks inside the bridge started growing too fast.  The reason for the failure was bad steel used to support the concrete.

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