Washington Roads - WA 16




The fog rolls in on little cat feet in Gig Harbor. Either Gold Mountain is ahead, or those are the Olympic Mountains in the peninsular distance.


Heading north on Jackson Ave. in Tacoma, starting with a white-on-white shield at 6th Ave. and ending with a look west at the Tacoma Narrows Bridge and definitely the Olympic Mountains. I'll get there before you can make it the last 1/8 mile.


The WA 16 freeway opened through Tacoma in 1971, and the Skyline Drive pedestrian bridge finally opened in 1986 to reconnect neighborhoods. With this design, it was worth the wait. These are my only EB photos on the page.


Let's head west and find ourselves on the original - well, the replacement 1950 span that carried 4 lanes of WA 16 traffic until the twin span opened in 2007. I don't think I need to rehash the story of the original Tacoma Narrows Bridge. Suffice to say, the new one had quite a bit more wind stiffening to it instead of going for sleek, graceful, incompletely engineered elegance. You can see gratings between the lanes, which help with drainage but may also help break up the wind as it crosses the bridge.


The new span tries, but it's a poor imitation of the old one.


Completing the northwestward journey across the Narrows.

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