The Lind Ave I-405 crossing will have been closed for over a year by the time WSDOT gets the repairs completed late this summer. Bid openings for this project, which will determine the repair construction contractor, will occur on May 24. Design work has been underway for months.
One of the bridge beams was badly damaged when it was hit by a backhoe being towed by a truck on I-405 on June 13, 2022.
The damage has closed the bridge to all automobile traffic, creating an inconvenience for people working and doing business in Southwest Renton, along the Grady corridor and in the valley. While the current detour is not too bad, the loss of this bridge has also reduced redundancy in Renton’s street grid system, such that damage or a bad accident on Oakesdale Ave could create major backups.
After bids are opened on May 24, a construction contractor will be identified, and a contract will be finalized and approved. Hopefully construction will begin this summer as currently predicted on the Washington State DOT website.
The work will take several months. The bridge will be closed to pedestrian and bike traffic in addition to automobile traffic once construction gets underway. Construction will probably create minor additional impacts to traffic in the area with heavy vehicle movements and other activities. I would expect to see brief I-405 lane closures, and possibly even a full closure, announced to support specific operations in setting the replacement beam, but that schedule will be dependant on the contractor’s input and planning documents.
Information about the bid opening can be found on the WSDOT website here.
Why do I get the feeling that if this happened in Bellevue, it would have been fixed sooner?
Renton officials should keep a watchful eye to verify the bid opening and contractor selection goes smoothly; if for some reason the State does not like any of the bids or they are substantially over the engineering estimates, Renton’s elected officials should push to quickly remedy the issue and keep the project moving. With everything else WSDOT has going, including I-405 widening and emergencies like the startling new giant pothole on the West Seattle Bridge onramp, it would be easy for them to let this project slide if the bidding process does not go well– But Renton should be as assertive as Bellevue or Mercer Island would be to get this fixed. (Renton’s Transportation Department has some great engineers, and I suspect they are watching this closely.)
In my opinion, the City of Renton needs an ombudsman to monitor how our regional partners treat us. There’s no reason we should almost perpetually be expected to take 2nd place in other municipalities.
Sorry… had a bit of after-work libations: “2nd place to other municipalities.”
I’m not sure if this is a role for our city government or a position we as citizens should take, but frankly, I’m kind of tired of not getting what we’ve paid for in taxes just because other places have their hands out faster than we do.
I also don’t think it’s entirely the fault of any of our electeds. We, as citizens, haven’t stood up for ourselves in a way. The last time we got feisty was when King County wanted to shrink our library.
Armondo and I were once informed that when the State Department of Transportation is landscaping freeway projects through Bellevue there is a Bellevue “Palette” that they need to comply with. We want a Palette too, but not the old Palette of Himalayan Blackberry, Scotch Broom, Ivy, the occasional juvenile fir tree that gets cut down when it gets to a decent size, with a miscellaneous litter mulch.
That ‘pallet’ justification really pisses me off. It’s like WSDOT codified being jerks to us and gave themselves their own excuse for their behavior.
Speaking of bad landscapes, have you seen the quarry landscape the Downtown Renton Safeway put right next to the sidewalk? One slip and your body will be shattered like it was put on a medieval breaking wheel.
No, I haven’t seen it. I can’t even imagine what it looks like, so I’ll go take a look next time I’m downtown. Does it look like it was put in as hostile architecture?
Not just hostile… speaking for myself, just looking at it gave me an existential crisis severe enough that I began to doubt God’s love for us.
Since I brought it up, this is the roadside landscape manual on WSDOT website, covering how they chose plants to go with highway projects. It sounds like there are many other references, memos, agreements with cities and and other partners, etc that work in conjunction with this manual to determine the plant palette of any specific highway section. https://wsdot.wa.gov/publications/manuals/fulltext/m25-30/800.pdf