Get ready for these major I-90 summer projects, starting next week
Apr 7, 2016, 9:51 PM | Updated: May 6, 2016, 9:52 pm
We’re still skiing at Snoqualmie Pass, but that doesn’t mean construction season can’t get underway. Start looking for lane closures and orange cones as you head east of the summit on I-90.
Construction started ramping up again this week on the project to widen the freeway east of the pass. The state has already partially built a new lane in each direction. The plan is to keep adding road to complete a seven-mile stretch from Hyak to beyond Keechelus Lake.
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The project also includes paving work along the way to improve what is a common weekend chokepoint, especially once the weather gets nicer.
“During the summertime, especially, and on major summer holidays and on weekends, we see that area right between Cle Elum and Easton just back up for hours and hours,” said Meagan Lott, with the Washington State Department of Transportation. “I’m sure people have definitely experienced that; I’ve experienced that. It’s not something we want to endure.”
Lott said the 2015 legislative funding package included more money to extend the lane expansion another eight miles to Easton, giving drivers three lanes in each direction.
So expect to see work being done east of Snoqualmie Pass for a few years to come — but progress is progress.
“We also have a number of paving projects that are going to take place in Cle Elum, in Easton, and in Ellensburg,” Lott said. “So what people are going to see this week, starting up in the Cle Elum area, we are going to close one of the off-ramps at milepost 84 so that we can do some repaving work in the westbound lanes that desperately need it.”
Part of this project includes a wildlife overpass — over I-90 — near Price Creek. That’s just east of Keechelus Lake. It’s a place where scientists have found a natural migration path.
Lott says the goal of the overpass is to keep drivers and wildlife out of each other’s way.
“If anyone has had a collision with a large elk or a deer, or any other large animal, it’s never a pretty scenario,” she said. “So, basically, the wildlife crossing is not only going to protect wildlife but also drivers and improve safety in that corridor.”
Rock-blasting over the pass is expected to start again in May as the painting project on the Vantage Bridge is beginning.
So be sure to check your route east of the pass on I-90 to make sure you won’t get caught in unexpected construction delays. Pack extra snacks and water in case you do.
