A Bridge to Nowhere

When I was just a wee little commuter back in the 70's (I'll be 44 this year) I can remember the mood in the Seattle area being pretty dark. Boeing had a huge financial crash at the end if the 60's dropping their number of employees by 70% by 1971. That prompted two real-estate agents to put up the iconic "Will the last person leaving Seattle – Turn out the lights" billboard. This is the world I was born into. I can remember seeing half built housing developments all over, and lots of family friends struggling or moving away.

Sometime during that period they had begun building several freeway ramps and as the tax base dwindled so did those projects. Those ramps remained unfinished and loomed over the downtown drive for many years reminding everyone of leaner times.

We travel every day across an elevated section of freeway called the Nalley Valley Viaduct. In the last year or so they have begun a huge project to replace and expand this inadequate interchange. Traffic suffers on all approaches to this area and it really does need the work done.

The project is truly ambitious. They are just in that stage where several of the ramps are half built and I can't help but think back to my childhood and those bridges to nowhere. Considering our current economic woes and the country being involved in a long running controversial war I get a really odd nostalgic feeling as we travel through there.

All that aside, I am actually quite hopeful for the work that is being done. Generally speaking my experience with large freeway construction projects has never been good. They always seem like half measures that manage to keep construction companies employed but never go quite far enough to solve the problem. I-405 for instance has been under major construction near the S-Curves for as long as I can remember. Literally by the time they complete one upgrade or alteration it is already obsolete and they start all over again.

I have to say I was really reaching that point in life that I could say I was getting my "curmudgeon on" for large freeway projects. That's when the Tacoma Narrows Bridge project came into my life. If you aren't familiar with this bridge you may know it by its infamous name, Galloping Gertie.

When I first met Tammy and found out she lived in Lakebay my response was "Umm, Washington?" Then she clarified by saying, "Key Peninsula" and I replied, "Umm, Washington?" I had been out that way before on my way to Shelton and happily ignored all the place names in between. On our second date I volunteered to make the trek to her place, meet the parents, receive the obligatory dog piling from their vicious pack of toy poodles, and get a feel for where she lived. I thoroughly enjoyed the trip, but it wasn't long before I started to get a taste of their pain dealing with SR-16 and "The Bridge".

After Gertie fell into the Narrows they replaced her with a new 4 lane bridge. As more people moved to growing areas like Gig Harbor the bridge became a strangle hold choke point that caused waves of delays all the way back to I-5. It was clearly time to come up with a Heimlich maneuver effort. Washington's typical underwhelming effort wasn't going to be sufficient. Then I heard the words Toll Bridge and despair set in.

We watched the bridge go up and I cringed with every brick and beam. Finally the day came for this monster to open and it was as if someone had punched the Narrows in the solar plexus. Tammy likes to say that SR-16 went from the worst part of her commute to the best, and that's saying something. Frankly it's the finest capitol project I've ever even heard of. The new bridge returns 20-30 minutes each day to us.

I still get M.A.S.H. flash backs when we drive through the new construction and probably will until those bridges grow into overpasses. I'll even continue to get the occasional vision of Speed launching the Mach 5 off one to safely land on another conveniently placed surface street. That car was shaped like a lethal weapon! He wore a 5 point seatbelt and helmet while Trixie bounced around in the passenger seat like a crash test dummy. That cartoon was awesome. Do kids even watch cartoons anymore? Eh, I guess with DVD players in the Family Truckster the stuff going on outside the window doesn't rate.

Don't drive angry! Drive weird!