A weekend-long closure of State Route 18 will shut down both directions of the roadway over Tiger Mountain summit around the clock starting Friday night, Aug. 15.
The closure is for maintenance and improvements.
Beginning at 9 p.m. Friday, Aug. 15, until 5 a.m. Monday, Aug. 18, SR 18 will close between Interstate 90 and Issaquah-Hobart Road, according to the Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT). Drivers will need to seek alternate routes. Freight traffic should use I-405 and I-90 throughout the weekend. Issaquah-Hobart Road and Issaquah city streets are not suitable for semi-trucks.
No traffic will be allowed over Tiger Mountain summit during the closure, and only local traffic to Southeast 104th Street will be permitted south of I-90.
Both WSDOT maintenance and contractor crews will utilize the closure to make improvements on different sections of the highway over Tiger Mountain, limiting the number of SR 18 closures needed.
SR 18 maintenance work
Maintenance crews will perform annual work on the highway, including:
• Repair damaged guardrail
• Improve sign visibility
• Perform vegetation management
• Repave sections of the roadway
• Perform safety checks
SR 18 widening
Meanwhile, contractor crews for the I-90/SR 18 Interchange Improvements project will work on widening a 2-mile stretch of SR 18 to two lanes in each direction between I-90 and Deep Creek. Their work will include:
• Leveling and preparing the new lanes for a final layer of asphalt
• Milling and grinding asphalt
• Installing guardrail
• Landscaping, including mulching and hydroseeding
• Removing temporary barriers
Once SR 18 widening is complete later this fall, it will work with the diverging diamond interchange that opened July 25 to improve traffic flow through the corridor.
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