PORT ANGELES — Drivers honked and cheered from vehicles lined up on Eighth Street as they waited to be among the first to drive across the two newly replaced bridges on Tuesday afternoon.
The vehicles followed the Port Angeles Police Department’s brand new Dodge Charger, two older model police cars and a fire engine, which made the inaugural run over the concrete versions of the Valley Creek bridge and the Tumwater Creek bridge after Mayor Gary Braun cut the ribbon in a ceremony at 2 p.m.
“I am most definitely ready for this,” Braun said, adding that he was about a year old when the twin spans that the new concrete structures replaced — the second of three sets of bridges over the creeks– were built in 1936.
The new bridges originally were expected to re-open in November. During their closure, a major arterial through town was disrupted.
The bridges, which cost $24.6 million — $21.6 million in state Department of Transportation grants, and $3 million in city funds — opened to pedestrians earlier in the day.
Among the crowd of about 150 people who gathered to watch the afternoon ceremony was Josephine Pedersen, a longtime Port Angeles resident.
She was born in the same year that the original bridges were built — 1913 — and remembered making use of them since the time she was 3 three years old.
“I can remember running across the first bridge and waving to the truck drivers who were building the second one,” she said.
“Back then, we didn’t have vehicles, but we would always be running across them,” she said.
“This is my third [version of the] bridge to stand on.”
The two bridges constructed in 1936 were built to replace the 1913 bridges, which were failing as loads got heavier and the wooden spans could not support them.
The 1936 bridges were constructed at a cost of $135,000 to the city of Port Angeles, said Glenn Cutler, city public works director.
How many days?
During Tuesday’s ceremony, Cutler asked the group, “Do you know how many days it has been since the first bridge closed?
“I do.”
No one could answer.
Cutler said that it had been 549 days since the Tumwater Creek bridge closed in August, 2007, followed by the closure of the Valley Creek bridge in September of that year.
Marie Cauvel, who lives in the few-block area between the bridges, was thrilled by the re-opening of the bridges.
“I’m very glad, because the delays have been laughable until now.
“The most frustrating thing has been the barriers down at Ceder Street, so when you want to go back home, you have to drive past and circle all the way around.”
The barriers, which were removed Tuesday, prevented people from turning left off of Marine Drive onto Cedar Street.
Port Angeles City Council member Don Perry said he was excited, not only for himself — he lives on the west side of town and has been navigating the detours since the bridges closed — but also for the businesses on the west side and in between the bridges who have been suffering for lack of traffic.
“I’m pretty excited that it can help the businesses between the bridges,” he said.
“We are so thankful for the community’s support and use of those businesses up until now.”
Steve Bridge, who owns 8th Street Bridge’s Grill — who had said that if the bridges weren’t reopened by the end of March he feared he might have to close — said Tuesday he was almost too busy to talk.
“We have traffic finally,” he said at about 5 p.m. “Even now we are busy. This is such a difference from yesterday.”
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Reporter Paige Dickerson can be reached at 360-417-3535 or at paige.dickerson@peninsuladailynews.com.
