I-5 Bridge lanes to close Saturday night

Planning on heading into Oregon after 10 p.m. Saturday?

If so, you will need to take the Interstate 205 Bridge because the southbound span of the Interstate 5 Bridge will be closed for eight hours, from 10 p.m. to 6 a.m. Sunday, for bridge maintenance.

The bridge’s southbound sidewalk also will be closed during that time. The bridge’s northbound span and sidewalk will remain open.

The Washington State Department of Transportation has used message boards on I-5 to alert drivers about Saturday’s closure.

Drivers needing to head south into Oregon should detour onto Highway 14 eastbound and take I-205 southbound into Oregon.

Although Saturday’s closure of the southbound span might be inconvenient, it will be nothing compared with the two-week shutdown of the northbound span scheduled for September 2020 to replace a cracked trunnion, which is part of the lifting mechanism used to raise and lower the drawbridge.

Washington and Oregon jointly own the I-5 Bridge, which the Oregon Department of Transportation operates and maintains. The northbound span opened in 1917, followed by the southbound span in 1958.