Alert 8/23-24: Spokane Street Swing Bridge closed

It's time for another weekend closure of the Spokane Street Swing Bridge to West Seattle, and as with other closures in recent years there will be no dedicated detour.

The bridge will close at 7 a.m. Saturday and won't reopen until 10 p.m. Sunday.

However, this is the first closure happened after the majority of the Georgetown to Downtown protected bike lane has been constructed. So while there is still no complete bike connection along the east side of the Duwamish River from the closed bridge to the 1st Avenue S Bridge, riders can reroute to the other side of the industrial district for a protected route from Stadium Station into Georgetown. It's a bit out of the way, and there still isn't a great way to get from Georgetown to the 1st Ave S Bridge, but if I were traveling between West Seattle and central Seattle I would either ride the new bike lanes, take a bus or take the Water Taxi. If you're heading further south, consider routing from Georgetown to South Park via the South Park Bridge, a route that also has an in-construction bike route with large sections already open.

The swing bridge continues to be unreliable. It was stuck for a few hours earlier this week, for example, and West Seattle Blog reported that people biking and walking had to duck under the arm to get across. That's not great. Hopefully the ongoing rehab project can get help these issues under control, but we need better permanent alternative routes to the 1st Ave S Bridge because these closures keep happening whether planned or not. We need redundancy for all our bike routes, but especially this one.

More details from SDOT:

To keep the Spokane St Swing Bridge, commonly known as the low bridge, reliably operating, starting tomorrow (August 23), from 7am, until 10pm on Sunday (August 24),the low bridge will be closed for people driving, biking, rolling, and walking. During this time, crews will repair a part of the recently installed turn cylinder called a manifold," which helps control how fast the bridge moves. Additional work on this project is expected to continue through 2025

• Planning, design, and construction for the initial phase of the Spokane St Swing Bridge Rehabilitation Program took place from 2020 to 2022.
• Additional phases of this work will continue throughout 2025.