Peace and quiet ahead: Boylston Ave off-ramp to shut down for noise walls
Oct 4, 2024, 2:34 PM | Updated: 4:04 pm
With more people moving into the region, freeways are getting louder and a growing number of neighborhoods are drowning in the noise.
That’s where noise reduction through the use of sound walls comes into play. The Eastlake neighborhood is the latest to get help along Boylston Avenue East, near the south end of the Ship Canal Bridge. The next phase will shut down the Boylston Avenue off-ramp from Interstate 5 (I-5) south for part of this weekend.
This weekend’s portion of this project is scheduled to close the Boylston Avenue off-ramp at 7 a.m. Saturday through 8 p.m. Sunday. The Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) will reopen the ramp temporarily between 2:30 p.m. and 5:30 p.m. Saturday to accommodate traffic headed to the Husky Stadium at the University of Washington (UW).
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In addition to the ramp closure, Boylston Avenue East will be closed between Franklin Avenue and Hamlin Street. Local residents will still have access.
This project is expected to last into the winter months. Most of the prep work so far has entailed the process of clearing trees.
“Before we even start doing all this, our arborists went out to the site and evaluated all the trees there to see which trees could stay and which ones we would need to move, based on the work we are going to do,” Amy Moreno, communications consultant with WSDOT, told KIRO Newsradio. “We have a roadside plan that, every time we take down a tree, we have to plant so many trees to go up with it. We’re planting 200 trees to make up for the trees we took out.”
Those 200 hundred trees that will be planted are the result of just seven total trees cut down. However, not all of those trees will be planted at the job site, as most will be planted at a different location within the neighborhood. The reason the ratio of planting new trees to downed trees is so unbalanced is because a majority of the new trees will not survive, according to Moreno.
Neighborhood residents have voiced their concerns about the loss of trees.
“Their hope was that we would leave part of the stumps,” Moreno said. “Arborists were involved in this, and we left part of the stumps; those can be ecological support for insects and birds.”
Drivers will notice those stumps as they exit at Boylston Avenue.
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Despite crews preparing the noise walls for weeks, Moreno confirmed drivers still won’t be seeing the walls yet, as construction for these walls is expected to continue this season.
“The wall is going to be prefabricated pieces of concrete that are going to be brought to the site,” Moreno said. “We’re not going to be putting bricks up along the side of the freeway.”
The walls will be set in place at a later date, which has yet to be announced, as of this reporting. When that work does begin, WSDOT will need to block a lane on I-5 south as well as the Boylston Avenue off-ramp.
Contributing: Frank Sumrall, MyNorthwest
Nate Connors is a traffic reporter for KIRO Newsradio. You can read more of Nate’s stories here. Follow Nate on X and email him here. Head here to follow KIRO Newsradio Traffic’s profile on X.
