(WSB photo of original Fauntleroy Expressway cushion replacement work, by Christopher Boffoli)

In case you missed our mention of this during today’s afternoon/evening commute coverage: SDOT has announced the new schedule for the re-replacement of earthquake-safety cushions under the west end of the West Seattle Bridge, the section officially known as the Fauntleroy Expressway.

You might recall the original schedule, first reported here hours before the Viaduct closure schedule was announced, would have overlapped both projects, with the Fauntleroy Expressway work set to start two days before the Viaduct closure. It wasn’t just the overnight bridge closures that led to concerns and questions, but also the plans for lane closures day and night on surface Spokane Street under the bridge, and SDOT finally agreed to push the work back to mid-May.

Now, they’ve announced the start date – and note some specific plans if the Viaduct closure goes longer than expected:

The previously delayed start of the Fauntleroy Expressway (West Seattle Freeway) Bearing Pad Replacement Project has been rescheduled, with the first overnight closure of the structure now slated for Sunday, May 15. This will be the first of an expected 40-50 weeknight closures of the structure, with closures each week beginning on Sunday evening and finishing on Friday morning. The bridge will be closed from 9 p.m. each night until 5 a.m. the following morning. The Expressway will NOT be closed on Friday or Saturday nights. SDOT appreciates the public’s patience while this work is being done.

On those weeknights with Mariners or Sounders games with attendance of 20,000 or more, the Expressway closures will not begin until 11 p.m.

Daytime preparatory work underneath the bridge will begin next Monday, May 9. This will include pressure washing the underside of the structure, which will require closure of the parking underneath the structure. (Once the overnight closures begin, the parking restrictions below the bridge will be limited to the work zone under active construction.)

The contractor may reduce traffic on surface Spokane Street below the bridge to a single lane in either direction. However, until the Alaskan Way Viaduct reopens, the two eastbound surface lanes of Spokane Street will remain open each morning until traffic dissipates, which may be as late as 10 a.m. In the afternoon, the contractor will maintain two westbound lanes no later than 3:30 p.m.

Construction crews will be replacing the 674 bearing pads on the Fauntleroy Expressway from just west of the Delridge Way on/off ramp westward to where the road turns south (where the road is no longer a bridge.) Bearing pads provide a cushion between the bridge girders and the horizontal support for the girders, and are important to preserving and protecting the long term integrity of the bridge.

The work is complex, requiring each bridge segment to be jacked up in order to remove the old bearing pads and install the new ones. Crews will set up the jacks on the underside of the bridge during the day, with the actual jacking and bearing pad replacement work done at night while the bridge is closed (impacting the fewest number of motorists). The work will move from east to west, one horizontal support at a time.

The Fauntleroy Expressway was built in 1963, spans 2,527 feet and carries more than 60,000 vehicles per day. An initial seismic retrofit of the structure was completed in 1994, when column jackets were erected around select columns, and post tensioning was added to the supports. Longitudinal restrainers were also included to interconnect the roadway over each support.

A second phase of seismic retrofit began in 2011, when SDOT updated the structure by strengthening 33 columns with steel jackets, strengthening pile caps, and adding longitudinal restrainers. At the time, it was decided to take advantage of the seismic work by also replacing the original bearing pads which were reaching the end of their service life.

SDOT engineers discovered a problem after the bearing pad replacement had been completed. The outside design consultant had order the wrong pad. Instead of replacing the existing pads with rigid ones, they mistakenly ordered less rigid pads. The design consultant has acknowledged their error, and will be paying the $1.9 million cost of replacing the pads.

New standards for bearing pads have since been established, so the bearing pads being installed now will have steel shims embedded within them, which is expected to give them a longer service life than the originals.

This information will also be posted to the project website.

(SDOT MAP with camera/incident links; OFFICIAL #99CLOSURE INFOSITE; ‘low bridge’ closed? LOOK HERE)

(Click any view for a close-up; more cameras on the WSB Traffic page)

4:18 PM: A bit late to the party, sorry.

4:25 PM: Take a look at the camera – the eastbound bridge looks as bad as the morning commute. Westbound, not so bad so far.

4:40 PM-5:05 PM: The “low bridge” has just reopened after a 25-minute closure.

5:11 PM: And SDOT has tweeted that the “low bridge” is closing to surface traffic again right now, for a maritime-traffic opening, just a few minutes after the previous one.

5:16 PM: Speaking of SDOT, looks like they’re optimistic the Viaduct closure will end after about two weeks, as expected. They’ve announced the new date for the start of the Fauntleroy Expressway seismic-cushion-re-replacement closures: May 15th. If you recall our original reports earlier this year, this project will involve dozens of overnight closures of the west end of the bridge. It originally was set to start April 27th, as announced hours before the state set April 29th for the start of the Viaduct closure; questions about the potential misery index caused by that confluence led SDOT to push it back to mid-May, and now we have a date.

5:24 PM: SDOT just tweeted that the low bridge is back open to non-maritime traffic.

5:32 PM: Just heard a mutual-aid call for SFD’s Highland Park-based Engine 11 to head to 8th SW and SW 100th in Greenbridge (White Center), just a few blocks south of the city limits. Don’t know what the incident is but we’ll head over for a look. 8th is an arterial in the area so this serves as a potential traffic alert.

5:50 PM: Our crew arriving there says it was a crash, not affecting traffic and a tow truck has already arrived, but deputies say paramedics were needed and not available from North Highline FD so they called for SFD.

Meantime, back on this side of the city/county line, we have multiple reports that surface traffic, especially downtown, is bollixed.

6:21 PM: We’ll continue tracking bridge closures until about 7 pm – South Park Bridge just went up for a maritime opening. And remember that the Water Taxi runs into the evening since it’s Friday. Paul Nicholson sent this photo of the 4:15 pm line:

Find the schedule and other info here.

6:27 PM: The South Park Bridge is back open to surface traffic again.

6:36 PM: And now the low bridge (Spokane Street Swing Bridge) has closed to surface traffic for the third time this pm commute.

6:50 PM: The low bridge has reopened to surface traffic.

7:04 PM … and it’s closed again.

7:12 PM: Open again. We’re moving on now – if there are any major incidents for the rest of the night, and over the weekend, we’ll report them individually.

8:52 PM: One more update – 234 of the 385 under-the-Viaduct feet now for the tunneling machine, as of the final progress report of the night:

See the full update (including a stern warning!) here.

(SDOT MAP with camera/incident links; OFFICIAL #99CLOSURE INFOSITE; ‘low bridge’ closed? LOOK HERE)

(Click any view for a close-up; more cameras on the WSB Traffic page)

5:10 AM: Good morning – we’re starting the second week of the Alaskan Way Viaduct’s closure. The early-morning progress report for under-Viaduct tunneling: 208 of 385 feet.

5:29 AM: Bridges and streets on the outbound routes are looking OK – no early incidents. The truck backup from yesterday should not be replicated today – the Port told us Terminal 46’s operator would be opening at 3 am, something it did not do yesterday.

5:47 AM: We’re about to head to the Water Taxi dock to check in on today’s runs – looks like a great day to sail. A commenter asked about the shuttles from Pier 2 – which hasn’t maxed out its parking spots yet – and whether their “continuous” operation had changed. No, said the WT’s Greg Lerner, but: “The one thing we’ve learned is that the shuttle needs to leave from Pier 2 about 11 minutes before departure to ensure riders have the time when they get to Seacrest Park to buy tickets (if needed) and walk down to the boat. Knowing this, we will not send a shuttle prior to this time (between sailings) if we don’t feel it can make it back to depart again by 11 minutes before the next sailing. We’re hoping riders are attentive to our closure brochures that suggest riders arrive at Pier 2 about 20 minutes prior to their departure.”

6:07 AM: Beautiful sunrise. Meantime, the high bridge, is of course, starting to get busy. We’re approaching Seacrest – still lots of street parking on Harbor.

6:21 AM: Check out that view of the eastbound bridge – filling up. Meantime at Seacrest, just for posterity’s sake, we recorded the boarding for the first run of the day:

That’s county Marine Division director Paul Brodeur checking in with the crew toward the start. The count: 78.

6:37 AM: While the high bridge is busy, it’s not yet backed up to the 35th/Fauntleroy entrance, so that’s a good sign. Since it’s Friday, we should look ahead to weekend events likely to affect getting around:

*Sounders FC play San Jose at CenturyLink Field, 7 pm Saturday
*Opening Day of boating season on Saturday – if you’re U-District-bound, note that Montlake Bridge will be open for marine traffic much of the day
*Lung Force Walk on Saturday and The Color Run on Sunday, both downtown

SDOT’s roundup has details on those and more.

6:54 AM: 110 for the second Water Taxi run of the day, down from 137 yesterday. The dock has a soundtrack all its own … sea lions barking from the barge buoys, Canada geese honking as they fly by, jets overhead (saw a KAL 747 earlier this hour), and of course the maritime traffic – Doc Maynard’s Vashon counterpart Sally Fox was visible in the semi-distance earlier as it headed toward downtown.

7:19 AM: Crash reported on the eastbound bridge near the 1st Avenue exit.

7:23 AM: Thanks to the texter who tells us, from a bus, what’s happening at the crash scene: “2-car collision, east end of WS Bridge, where the lanes coming up from the low bridge merge. Fire truck blocking bus lane and part of the right all-vehicle lane… Drivers still in their cars talking with police [when texter’s bus passed], didn’t *appear* to be serious injury.” Meantime, 7:15 am Water Taxi tally was 198. (Added: Our video from that boarding:)

We’re leaving the dock now, headed to see what the Avalon/Manning situation by Luna Park is looking like after yesterday’s troubles.

7:34 AM: That helicopter over the bridge is TV checking out traffic because of the crash.

Meantime, another bus passenger sent a photo (added above) saying it looks like the crash is clearing. (Added) And seconds after we typed that, SDOT verified via Twitter that ****the crash has cleared.****

7:41 AM: Checking out Avalon at Harbor/bridge onramp/Manning/etc. intersection, all is well – 21X and 116 just went by on the way to the bridge.

8:03 AM: Spent a few minutes observing at Avalon/Manning.

No left turning, no backups. (Did everybody divert today, or lots of people with three-day weekends, maybe?) Next, we’re heading to check out the bicycle commute under the bridge.

8:38 AM: From our stop on the path/trail by West Marginal Place:

Steady stream of riders going by. Low bridge has not opened for maritime traffic so far this morning, by the way.

9:02 AM: Just dispatched, Seattle Fire crash response to 9th/Barton.

9:25 AM: Haven’t heard any further details on that – the SFD response has closed, so here’s hoping that’s a good sign. By all accounts, today’s morning commute hasn’t been too bad. If you have any new questions about traffic or tunneling, please comment (or e-mail us at editor@westseattleblog.com) since as usual we will be on the media conference call, happening around 11:30 am. And we’ll have afternoon/evening coverage again, starting around 4 pm. (Inbetween, if there are any significant incidents affecting major corridors such as one of the bridges, we would publish a standalone report, as always.)