Salmon Creek — the place, not the stream — was crowded even before the emergence of a major university with almost 3,000 students and a huge hospital with 662 beds and 832 workers. Anyone who has driven Northeast 134th Street in recent years has been fortunate to actually drive and not wait. Congestion has become so severe that three development moratoriums of a year or two each have been imposed by Clark County commissioners since 1997. Evening rush-hour traffic exiting northbound Interstate 5 often gets backed up onto the freeway.
Impatient motorists have not suffered in vain through all of these aggravations. The problems have prompted (later than many people would like) one of the largest local transportation projects in the past two decades: a $133 million interchange that will extend Northeast 139th Street over Interstates 5 and 205, connecting the large retail area on the west side of the freeways with the area that includes Washington State University Vancouver and Legacy Salmon Creek Medical Center.
We don’t for a minute believe this gigantic project will eliminate all traffic challenges in and around Salmon Creek, but it sure will go a long way in reducing congestion. Also, it will improve safety and create jobs.
These types of projects typically get launched with a gathering of politicians for an ostentatious ribbon cutting. That can be expected a little later. But starting this month, a relatively small project just east of the Fred Meyer store will mark the unofficial start of the overall project. Rejoice, Salmon Creekers, when you see graders and bulldozers clearing that parcel. It’s the first ground turned in the long-awaited freeway interchange work. As Stephanie Rice reported in Friday’s Columbian, this first project will produce a new Park & Ride lot for C-Tran’s use as early as next summer. The current Park & Ride north of 134th Street will become a stormwater treatment area.
