In the first of six planned construction projects, the Puget Sound Gateway Program this week awarded a contract for the 70th Avenue East Bridge Project in Washington.
Guy F. Atkinson Construction will run the project, from design to build, with approval from the Washington State Department of Transportation. They won the contract with a $40.9 million proposal, with which they intend to replace the existing two-lane bridge with a four-lane bridge running over Interstate 5. The bridge will also include a pedestrian and bike path, and the area will consist of a new roundabout, several hundred feet of new trail, along with a new parking lot to support it.
“The 70th Avenue East Project gets the Gateway Program off the ground – it’s really the first step toward completing two missing links in our highway system,” Craig Stone, Gateway Program administrator said. “By the end of next year, we’ll have three projects underway. It will be exciting to finally see the SR 167 and SR 509 projects being built.”
Construction is expected to begin in November, and the bridge should reopen in mid-2021. The bridge will be moved as part of the project and, in the current bridge’s place, a new interchange will be created that will serve as the first part of planned work on the SR 167 corridor.
The 70th Avenue East Bridge Project is the first of six Puget Sound Gateway Program design-build projects to start construction. The Gateway Program is composed of two main projects: the SR 167 Completion Project in Pierce County and the SR 509 Completion Project in King County. These projects provide essential connections to the ports of Tacoma and Seattle and will help ensure people and goods move more reliably through the region.