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The next phase of the State Route 18 Widening Project is underway and expected to last into April. Work will be done late at night to avoid disrupting peak travel times.

“We’ve got about a couple months worth of lane reductions coming to overnight,” Washington Department of Transportation (WSDOT) spokesperson Marcus Humberg said. “The whole point of this closure is to really kind of move on to three bridges we’re building here.”

WSDOT reported it has already built a four-lane bridge across Lake Creek, one across Raging River and one over Deep Creek.

“They need to put in some pilings alongside the road. And that’s going to require a lane reduction for the construction vehicles that are on the road to do that actual work,” Humberg explained. “And given there are only two lanes in that area, we’re going to have to take one lane for construction that leaves one lane for traffic, and that traffic will have to alternate east and westbound. One at a time with a pilot car kind of guiding everybody through the construction zone.”

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Humberg added that drivers can expect up to 20-minute delays between Deep Creek and Lake Creek, which is a mile-and-a-half apart. Closures are Sunday through Thursday, between 9 p.m. and 5 a.m.

According to Bob Van Horn, assistant project engineer with WSDOT, this project has another year before total completion.

“I think they really want to get traffic on them by early 2025. But that’s up in the air. There are a lot of things that have to happen between now and then to get that going. But when we do get traffic on the new bridges, there’s still some work to do below the bridges in the creek.”

Right now, the project is on schedule, according to Van Horn.

“So the work that’s been going on specifically has kind of been going in phases,” Humberg said. “They started just south of the intersection at I-90 and built a four-lane bridge across Deep Creek, and then they’ve been pushing the widening down toward the bridge at Raging River. So it’s kind of these bridges that are that essential piece that links everything together.”

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Humberg explained that as workers are building the bridges, they are widening the lanes.

“We know that there’s been a lot of traffic, there’s been several incidents on that freeway, up and over SR 18. And we’ve been taking a lot of steps to try and protect the public, we’ve reduced speed limits in the area,” Humberg said. “You’ve got to give yourself enough time, you’ve got to give the construction workers some patience, you got to follow those posted speed limits and really slow down in the construction zones.”

This project is vital to alleviate the growing traffic volumes. Recent numbers show there are roughly 28,000 daily commuters over Tiger Mountain.