Construction on 85th Street corridor to resume in spring

The City Council on December 10 initiated Kirkland’s last step toward an 85th Street Corridor that makes walking, driving and catching a bus safer and more efficient. The Council’s action authorized City staff to start the bidding process for the construction of key portions of the project. Those portions include sidewalks, intersection improvements, stormwater drainage and an upgraded water main.

This comes after Kirkland received in November a $1.45 million grant from the Transportation Improvement Board. Construction is expected to resume in the spring of 2014 and to be complete in 2015.

Kirkland has already made substantial progress toward the multi-modal vision for the corridor. In the fall of 2011, it upgraded Northeast 85th Street’s intersections with video detection. A year later, Kirkland buried utility lines and removed the utility poles from Northeast 120th Street to Northeast 128th Street. Last spring, Kirkland built sidewalks and bike lanes along 124th Avenue Northeast. To achieve all of this, Kirkland first had to acquire more right-of-way. That involved the acquisition of nearly 100 individual parcels.

For project information and to subscribe to receive project updates via email, visit www.kirklandwa.gov and search “NE 85th Improvements.”