Work has begun on the Burke-Gilman Trail where it passes through the University of Washington campus. Trail users will see a detour starting the early weeks of February as work on the Montlake Triangle Project – the triangular area from the corner of Northeast Pacific and Montlake to Stevens Way – gets underway. Work started the week of January 13 on the project which includes a new way for pedestrians and bicyclists to head up onto campus from that corner.
Trees are being cut down from areas where as much as six feet of fill will be added and work on seismic upgrades got underway in a portion of the Triangle Parking Garage as part of the work on a new pedestrian route from the corner straight up Rainier Vista. Once completed, people will no longer walk at street level across Northeast Pacific Place but will instead walk over it on a land bridge.
The land bridge entails lowering Pacific Place eighteen feet as well as adding fill so the ground from the corner slopes up over the land bridge, essentially creating an extension to the existing Rainier Vista.
The Burke-Gilman Trail Detour starting in February and lasting through March – the exact dates are still being determined – will skirt around the existing lower Rainier Vista.
In addition to the land bridge, a pedestrian bridge already partly constructed by Sound Transit will take people from the light rail station at Husky Stadium to the foot of Rainier Vista.
Read here about the history of the Burke-Gilman Trail which was founded by a group of Wedgwoodians in the 1970’s.
