Date:  Tuesday, July 28, 2009

Contact:
Troy Watts, WSDOT Field Engineer, 253-589-6100
Jamie Swift, WSDOT Communications, 360-507-4261

TACOMA – Getting from northbound Interstate 5 to State Route 16 is already tough for drivers. That’s why WSDOT is rebuilding the interchange at Nalley Valley. Unfortunately, it’s going to get worse for Tacoma drivers before it gets better.

WSDOT is building a new $183.7 million westbound viaduct across the Nalley Valley to eliminate one of Pierce County’s worst bottlenecks and reduce collisions by an estimated 60 percent. Renton-based Guy F. Atkinson Construction, LLC, is the contractor on this project, which is funded primarily by the 2003 gas-tax funding package.

Completion is scheduled for fall 2011. Until then, several challenges lie ahead for about 200 construction workers building this complicated project – and for 200,000 drivers who drive through it each day.

Starting next week, drivers will face longer backups than normal on the collector-distributor lanes that take traffic from northbound I-5 and 38th Street to westbound SR 16. Changes on the northbound collector-distributor lanes approaching the Nalley Valley Viaduct include an abbreviated merge from 38th Street, a lane shift to the right, and an earlier reduction in lanes from two to one.

Crews are scheduled to implement the changes overnight Monday, Aug. 3.

These long-term traffic revisions allow crews to set up barrier-protected work areas so they can drill 80-feet-deep shafts and build 50-feet-high columns on both sides of I-5. The columns will support a bridge that stretches up and over I-5 and eventually connects to the new westbound Nalley Valley Viaduct.

Traffic impacts include: shifts to temporary bridges in the fall and the spring, visual distractions, short-term lane and ramp closures, and long-term closures of all four SR 16/Sprague Avenue ramps. Three are already closed and the fourth (westbound SR 16 to Sprague Avenue) closes in the fall.

Project information and new construction photos online: http://www.tacomatraffic.com/.

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