How Revive I-5 will impact first Mariners home playoff game in decades

Construction couldn’t possibly get in the way of the Mariners’ first home playoff game in 7,688 days, could it?

This was the very first question I was asked by both co-workers and friends on Monday morning.

Will Revive I-5 be closing lanes on a weekend that features at least one home Mariners playoff game, the Seahawks, Huskies, and Kraken?

“Even before the Mariners won, we knew that there would be a lot of events,” said Tom Pearce of the Washington Department of Transportation (WSDOT).

I-5 project responsible for major weekend closures reaches halfway point

That’s why WSDOT dialed back work this weekend. “We knew it was going to be busy so we adjusted our Revive I-5 schedule,” Pearce said.

All lanes of I-5 will remain open all weekend south of downtown Seattle. The expansion joint work will only close one off-ramp.

“The only ramp we are going to close is to Columbian Way,” Pearce said. “Everything else is going to remain open. We’re going to have the ramp to the West Seattle Bridge open. It’s just the Columbian Way ramp.”

That’s it. One ramp. One that you can easily get around. It shouldn’t impact you in any way getting to the Stadium District.

Pearce said contractors are close to finishing all the expansion joint replacement work, and most of it is on the ramps and not the mainline of the freeway.

“We probably have a few weekends to go, but those are going to be weather-dependent,” Pearce said.

WSDOT is racing against fall weather and the impending rain that comes with it.

So why is it so important to get this work done now?

I-5 construction persists through Seafair weekend with WSDOT halfway through revival project

WSDOT can’t afford to still be messing with I-5 south of downtown come next spring. It has projects scheduled to start next year on I-5 in the Duwamish area up through the south end of Boeing Field.

It will start a five-year project to fix I-5 and express lanes north of downtown Seattle. I-405 is really going to ramp up the express toll lane widening from Bellevue to Renton, and 520 still has nine years of work before it’s finished.

“There is an amazing amount of work coming in the next several years, and that’s why it’s really important for us to finish up this work this year,” Pearce said.

Revive I-5 will likely take next weekend off because there will be a full closure of 520.

By the way, once the Mariners beat Houston they will be hosting either Cleveland or New York in the ALCS the weekend of Oct. 22. You’ve been warned.

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