Beach party on I-5 this weekend? Here’s why road will be covered with 6 inches of sand

Interstate 5 will become a road only dune buggy drivers could appreciate this weekend. The rest of us would get stuck up to our axles.

The freeway is getting covered in six inches of sand to act as a cushion while crews demolish a retired bridge in Fife on Friday and Saturday nights. It’s part of a state Department of Transportation project that includes the simultaneous construction of another bridge nearby that uses girders as long as a Boeing 747’s wingspan.

For the past few weeks, drivers have seen a bridge to nowhere at the Fife curve. It’s the old 70th Street overpass that was replaced with the new Wapato Way East overpass in 2021 . It’s partial demolition has left one end hanging in mid-air.

Now, it’s time to get rid of the rest of it.

The sand will protect the roadway as jack hammers send chunks of the old bridge onto I-5 during two overnight closures this weekend. Crews will clean up the sand in order for the freeway to open Saturday morning and then spread it down again for a second round of demo Saturday night into Sunday morning.

“They’ve got to clean up all that sand and sweep so that we can be open for drivers on Saturday and Sunday mornings,” said WSDOT spokesperson Kris Olsen. “We will not have people driving over six inches of sand.”

Girders

As the 70th Street bridge is reduced to rubble, the first of 15 girders will be set in place to create a bridge for state Route 167. The span is a crucial link for the SR 167 Completion Project that will eventually link the current terminus in Puyallup with state Route 509 at the Port of Tacoma.

Each of the 15 girders weighs 277,000 pounds and is 222 feet, 9 inches long. They will span the entire width of I-5 because there is no column in the road’s median.

WSDOT said multiple cranes positioned in both directions of I-5 will lift and set the girders in place.

Tacoma’s Concrete Technology Corp. produced the girders in Tacoma. The beams are the second longest pre-cast concrete girders in the world, according to WSDOT.

The world’s longest? It’s just down the road on southbound I-5, crossing the Puyallup River at 223 feet long.

The SR 167 project is building six miles of new tolled expressway between Puyallup and the Port of Tacoma in stages. The portion drivers along I-5 can see is scheduled to open in 2026. The entire project is planned for completion in 2029.