By Marcie Miller
Herald Writer
EVERETT — The reconstruction of the washed-out Lowell-Snohomish River Road won’t be completed until late October at the earliest, disappointing drivers who hoped to use the road as an alternate route during the ongoing Hewitt Avenue trestle work.
Although project engineer Roscoe Carnahan said the $9 million river road project is "on schedule and under budget," the road won’t be open to traffic until late October or early November, long after work is scheduled to be completed on the trestle.
Because work on the trestle is reducing lanes and sometimes causing long backups, some people are traveling out of their way to Marysville to the north and 128th Street SE to the south to reach their destinations to the east. The Lowell-Snohomish Road would have given some people a more convenient option.
Before the Snohomish River flooded and took a large bite out of the road in December 1995, about 4,000 cars a day used it as an alternate route between Snohomish and points east, including Everett and I-5, said Bruce DuVall, county project manager.
With the county’s increase in traffic, DuVall said that number could be 6,000 a day on the new road, and even more when it first opens.
"People are going to take it at first, but they will realize it’s not the fastest alternative and it will even out," DuVall said.
The road will be straighter and wider than previously, with two 11-foot-wide lanes and paved shoulders on both sides atop the 40-foot-wide dike.
Project manager Bill Ryan said most of the earthwork is finished, and one-third of the two-mile stretch is paved.
"It’s been a difficult road section to build because ordinarily road-building material is more rocky or sandy. This project needs clay and fine particles" because it’s in a floodplain, Ryan said. "It has to function as a waterproof dike as well as a road surface. It’s not a traditional road-building project."
Dike material also had to settle over the winter before the road could be built. After construction, what’s left of the old gravel dike between the river and the new dike will be breached in several places to allow water to flow properly during flooding.
The final phase will be to replant native vegetation and restore the wetland environment.
For George Stocker, secretary-manager of the Marshland Flood Control District, completion of the dike is also the completion of a 30-year flood-control project on the Snohomish River designed to protect the 6,000 acres in the district.
"It’s going to be a beautiful 40-foot-wide dike when all is said and done," Stocker said.
You can call Herald Writer Marcie Miller at 425-339-3292
or send e-mail to mmiller@heraldnet.com.
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