The Seattle Department of Transportation announced at 9:15 p.m. that he removed barricades at most entrances, a delicate operation that required clever timing, to protect workers and potential offenders from being struck. The four-minute trip between the peninsula and I-5 was a novelty for people accustomed to detours of up to six miles. “It was incredible. It felt like freedom, it was emotional,” said Janelle Bracken, who made a round trip and then joined a group of people swinging from the overpass on their bikes across Fauntleroy Way Southwest, more typically a place to salute politicians holding up signs. bridge traffic. Drivers below flash their headlights and honk their horns. Others on the footbridge said they look forward to a less stressful and more predictable commute. SDOT closed the span on March 23, 2020 because cracks discovered seven years earlier had begun to accelerate at a dangerous rate in four areas within the 150-foot-tall central main span. Stabilization and strengthening work, costing up to $78 million, is expected to keep the concrete structure aloft until about 2060. And drivers will no longer have to travel an extra 30 to 60 minutes via highways or roads in the Duwamish River Valley. This is the busiest city-owned bridge, carrying around 100,000 vehicles and almost 20,000 transporters before the pandemic and closure. The resumption of traffic on the bridge came hours ahead of what had been announced as a Sunday opening. The city had not planned an official opening ceremony and had kept the time a secret, worried that lines of cars would form, with drivers asking to brag about being among the first to cross the repaired bridge. The first stalled car was reported an hour after it reopened near the First Avenue South Bridge exit. The renovated bridge route contains multiple signs to help drivers navigate to the Vashon Island and Southworth ferries and a new electronic sign for eastbound traffic that simply read “West Seattle Bridge Open.” Traffic at 10:35 p.m. was lighter than a normal Saturday night and largely obeyed the 40 to 45 mph limit, except for one Subaru driver who passed two others and sped past the Nucor steelworks. King County Metro Transit buses that traveled on the lower swing bridge will return to the red bus lane on the multi-story bridge Monday morning. New, reflective markers make most lanes easier to follow, although the westbound layout looked confusing at one point near the Harbor Island exit due to uneven lighting and a lack of signs. For some West Seattle residents, the easier reconnection with the rest of the city has put them in the mood to party like it’s 1984. This was the year the bridge opened, giving the peninsula its first line of transport, unfettered by railway lines and the vagaries of ship traffic, after decades of reliance on ferries, trams and drawbridges. The weekly West Seattle Herald printed an unprecedented 104-page special section, “Bridging the Gap.” The neighborhood saw a projected increase in traffic and home values, making the traffic grand opening a more transformative event than the 2022 opening, West Seattle historian Clay Eals said last week. On Saturday, a friendly, low-key greeting set the stage for a less complicated commute: “Welcome Back,” read a placard posted by “Transit Riders Union fairy” Pauline Van Senus near a bus stop on California Avenue Southwest. A couple blocks north at O’Neill Plumbing, a 105-year-old local business, a calendar-shaped sign on the sidewalk titled Bridge Opening Day proclaims, “On Your Mark, Get Set…Go!” Read more about what went wrong and the repairs that were made. traffic expectations; and plans for eventual bridge replacement.
