Date:  Tuesday, December 15, 2009

Contact:
Dave Chesson, WSDOT Communications, 360-661-7829 (Burlington)
Pat McCormick, Engineering Manager, 425-225-8762 (Everett)

CAMANO ISLAND – Crews will install seven bridge girders, each the length of a Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner, at the new SR 532 General Mark Clark Bridge during Christmas week. Drivers should prepare for nighttime lane and complete road closures on SR 532 starting Monday.

The 186-foot long, 224,000-pound bridge girders will be trucked in from Tacoma on I-5 and I-405 on Dec. 21, 22, 23, 28 and 29.. The girders will leave Tacoma after 9 p.m. and will take up two lanes the entire way. Pictures of the bridge construction and girders are available on the WSDOT Flickr page.

The girders are being installed as part of the $84 million SR 532 corridor improvements project, funded through the 2005 gas tax package. Construction began this summer and is scheduled for completion in spring 2011. For more information on this project, visit the project web page at: www.wsdot.wa.gov/Projects/SR532.

Once the girders arrive on SR 532, crews will temporarily close the highway for a few minutes at a time as the oversized trucks make their way west to the bridge. Lane closures are scheduled to begin after 10 p.m. each evening between I-5 and Camano Island.

When the girders arrive around midnight at the Mark Clark Bridge, two 500-ton capacity cranes will hoist each girder into place. For the safety of drivers and crews, the Mark Clark Bridge will be closed to all but emergency vehicles for approximately 15 minutes per girder. That will allow crews time to attach the girders to cranes and safely move them into place.

Pictures of the girder installation will be posted on our General Mark Clark Bridge Flickr page immediately after the first girders are installed: www.flickr.com/photos/wsdot/sets/72157622044469081/. For weekly updates on this and all other traffic impacts in the region, please visit the WSDOT Snohomish County construction update report: www.wsdot.wa.gov/Northwest/Snohomish/Construction.

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