Ebey Slough to get new bridge as 65 state transportation projects begin

After 85 years of carrying cars over the marshes of Marysville, the Ebey Slough bridge will be replaced in one of the state's marquee projects for the 2010 construction season.

The new Highway 529 bridge is one of 65 state road projects in the Puget Sound region — largely funded by gas-tax increases in the past decade — to begin this year. Also beginning this year: a rebuilt Nalley Valley interchange at Highway 16 in Tacoma, the Sodo portion of the Alaskan Way Viaduct replacement in Seattle, and a new Federal Way interchange linking Interstate 5 with Highways 161 and 18.

The jobs will tie up traffic less than some other road projects in recent years — for example, the replacement of expansion joints on I-5 and Interstate 90, which caused prolonged multiple lane closures.

But this week, there will be overnight closures of up to three lanes Monday through Thursday nights on northbound I-5 in South Seattle, to install wiring for overhead message signs. Lanes will be reduced gradually starting at 7 p.m. and fully restored by 5 a.m. each following day.

Bridge built in 1925

The Marysville bridge, built in 1925, pivots midstream to allow marine traffic to pass.

Up in the steel span's wooden control room Monday morning, bridge tender Gregg Hays showed off the levers from a San Francisco cable car that are now used to activate the swing machinery about twice a month when tall boats need to pass.

Ebey Slough, fed by the Snohomish River as it nears Puget Sound, rises and falls with the tides; the new bridge will be higher than the old one, and marine traffic will be able to pass beneath it.

The room shuddered as a garbage truck lumbered below, heading for Everett. The bridge's steel girders are rusting, and its concrete has chipped.

For $4 million, the state will replace the two-lane span with a taller, fixed four-lane crossing, plus a bike lane and sidewalk in each direction.

About 17,000 vehicles make the crossing each day. The bridge is popular with Navy personnel who use it to skirt the north end of Everett to the waterfront. The new bridge could be ready for traffic by next year, said Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) spokeswoman Sandy Lam.

King County projects

In King County, this year's WSDOT work schedule includes a new northbound lane on Interstate 405 through Bothell; noise-absorbing panels on the I-5 Ship Canal Bridge in Seattle; added lanes on I-405 at the Renton S-curves; and a Highway 520 widening near Marymoor Park in Redmond.

Also this year, "smarter highways signs" are going up over I-5 in South Seattle and both Lake Washington floating bridges, to display lane closures and variable speed limits, in hopes of smoothing the traffic flow.

Snohomish County is getting a new Stanwood-Camano Island bridge; a rebuilt Smokey Point interchange of I-5; a concrete barrier in the I-5 median from Arlington to Marysville; a bus station on I-5 at Mountlake Terrace; and new merge ramps at I-5 and 196th Street Southwest in Lynnwood, along with a pedestrian bridge.

Mike Lindblom: 206-515-5631 or mlindblom@seattletimes.com