PORT ANGELES — Lower Elwha Road is on the verge of crumbling because of a high volume of heavy vehicles in use for Elwha River restoration projects, Clallam County Engineer Ross Tyler has told county commissioners.
The county arterial road provides the only access to the Lower Elwha Klallam tribal reservation west of Port Angeles.
It serves a new fish hatchery that was built as part of the $325 million federal project to restore the Elwha River to its natural condition.
The road also is being used by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to improve a dike on the lower reaches of the sediment-filled Elwha River.
So far, Olympic National Park officials have said they are under no obligation to help pay for the repairs.
“At this point, we’re concerned that it [the road] is going to fail catastrophically unless something is done,” Tyler said in a Tuesday briefing to the Board of County Commissioners.
“One of the trucks could knock out a big chuck of asphalt and somebody could drive into it in the middle of the night and lose control or whatever, so there’s a concern for public safety here.
“It also becomes a lot more costly to repair a road once it has gone past a certain point, and we’re pretty much there.”
Based on an estimate from Lakeside Industries, Tyler said it would cost at least $200,000 to repair Lower Elwha Road.
“We really need to take that step now to prevent a doubling or a tripling in the cost of fixing it,” added County Administrator Jim Jones, who asked Tyler and Associate County Engineer Joe Donisi to inspect the road and report on its condition last week.
Exactly who pays for the repairs has not been determined.
The National Park Service is overseeing the restoration project, but it involves several other federal agencies.
Commissioners Mike Chapman and Jim McEntire directed Jones to work with Olympic National Park Acting Superintendent Todd Suess to come up with an agreement to fix the road.
The last remnants of the Elwha Dam, built a century ago without fish ladders five miles south of the river mouth, were removed in March.
Demolition of the Glines Canyon Dam nine miles upstream from the lower dam is one year ahead of schedule. Glines Canyon dam and the reservoir behind it, Lake Mills, should be gone by next summer, federal officials said this month.
“I think this is an important point: the vehicles are all running legal weights because they have to go through the scales,” Tyler said.
“Damage, or wear, is a function of not only weight, but volume. And, of course, the volume has gone up considerably.”
Jones said Suess indicated that “they expect to run between 1,000 and 1,500 full truck loads starting this week to re-rock that levy, the second half of that levy.”
In a follow up interview, Tyler said the road is in no shape to handle that volume.
Jones said he has already told the park that the county’s “options are pretty slim.”
“We have to have an agreement,” he said.
Tyler said Suess told him that the park is under no obligation to pay for the repairs.
He added that the county has the ability to close the road to heavy vehicles if it has to.
“It wouldn’t be specific to the vehicles hauling for the federal project,” Tyler said.
“It would apply to my trucks. And it does allow exceptions for public transportation, emergency vehicles, school busses, that kind of stuff.
“That being said, what we really want is to re-open dialogue with the federal government and see if we can’t come to some kind of mutual agreement so that we don’t have to do this.”
The tribe is using federal dollars to build a second access road, a connection from Kacee Way to Stratton Road.
The county will accept the road into its 500-mile maintenance system once completed later this year.
Meanwhile, Lower Elwha Road is “failing pretty rapidly at this point, and the tribe has expressed some concerns informally on that point,” Tyler said.
Lower Elwha tribal Chairwoman Frances Charles was not available for comment Wednesday.
Chapman said an agreement with the federal government is necessary to keep the road open to heavy vehicles.
“Talk to Todd,” Chapman told Jones.
“See what you can come up with. But they’ve got to work with us here or else this whole road’s going to fail and it’s going to be closed anyway.”
Tyler said a mutual agreement “would be the best thing for everybody.”
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Reporter Rob Ollikainen can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 5072, or at rob.ollikainen@peninsuladailynews.com.
