Over the course of the summer, a contractor working for the Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) will be painting steel parts, as needed, on three of the City’s bridges on Magnolia and Queen Anne. Work will begin this week on the first of these bridges, the W Howe Street Bridge, between Magnolia Boulevard W and Clise Place W, adjacent to Magnolia Park.
On the West Howe Bridge, there is only a pedestrian railing on the south side of the bridge and no sidewalk on the north side. The contractor will paint the steel pedestrian railing on the south side of the bridge and the steel vehicle railing on the north side of the bridge. A temporary pedestrian path will be established in the roadway while the contractors are working on the south side, reducing vehicular traffic across the bridge to a single lane. Flaggers will be present to manage the traffic flow. Two-lane traffic will be restored at the end of each work day. The work is expected to take approximately three weeks to complete.
The painting crews will most likely then move to the W Dravus Street Bridge over the Burlington Northern Rail yard, between Magnolia and Interbay. The bridge railings, along with several light poles will be repainted. Crews will need to close the curb lane while painting; however, the two lanes of eastbound traffic will remain open 7 a.m. to 9 a.m. each weekday morning, and two westbound lanes will remain open each weekday afternoon from 3 p.m. until 6 p.m. There are sidewalks on both the north and south sides of the bridge, and at least one of them will always remain open during the painting. The work should take two to three weeks to complete.
The last of the three bridges to be painted will be the North Queen Anne Drive Bridge, a concrete and steel bridge that spans Wolf Creek Canyon (who knew there was such a canyon right on Queen Anne Hill!). The bridge carries traffic on N Queen Anne Drive between Second Avenue N and Nob Hill Avenue N. Pedestrian railings and lights poles will be painted, as well as a portion of the steel structure below the roadway. This work should take a month to six weeks to complete.
The work on all three of these bridges will be limited to weekdays, between 7 a.m. and 4 p.m.