PORT ANGELES — Ongoing work on Port Angeles’ combined sewer overflow project has closed a section of the Waterfront Trail from Francis Street Park east to roughly the middle of the former Rayonier mill site.
The closure of the trail, part of the Olympic Discovery Trail system, is expected to last until May 15, city spokeswoman Teresa Pierce said Friday.
Further east, the trail will be rerouted directly through the Rayonier Inc. property instead of winding around the property line as it now does, city Public Works Director Glenn Cutler said.
Across bridge
The trail, which will more closely hug the shoreline to the north, will run across a new bridge set to be installed over Ennis Creek, Cutler said.
“The community has been very supportive [of getting] the trail closer to the north,” he said.
For now, pedestrians wanting to access the portion of the trail east of the Francis Street closure will be detoured starting at Lincoln Street to Front Street, then to Georgiana Street via North Vine Street.
Pedestrians will then head east via Georgiana until Ennis Street, where they’ll head north until they hook back up with the trail near the site of the former Rayonier pulp mill.
Construction work also will close the old Rayonier mill parking lot at the north end of Ennis Street to all public parking, according to the city.
Crews from Ferndale-based IMCO Construction are completing the work as part of the city’s $41.7 million combined sewer overflow project, which will eventually extend sewer lines along the Waterfront Trail from downtown Port Angeles through the Rayonier mill site to the city’s wastewater treatment plant.
Crews currently are completing trenching work along the trail and snaking across the Rayonier property, Cutler said, adding that trenching is going as scheduled.
The trench, varying in depth from 6 feet to 8 feet, will hold three sewer pipes which eventually will carry additional stormwater and sewage to a 5-million-gallon tank purchased by the city from Rayonier.
The tank, formerly part of the pulp mill, which closed in 1997, will hold the water and sewage until it can be treated at the city’s nearby wastewater treatment plant.
Rehab work
City Project Manager James Burke said crews have begun rehabilitation work inside the tank to prepare it for holding the material.
The work — roughly 60 percent complete — includes applying a special coating to the interior and installing internal piping structures.
The goal of the combined sewer overflow project is to increase sewage and stormwater capacity between downtown Port Angeles and the wastewater treatment plant to reduce the number of events that historically have sent untreated stormwater and sewage into Port Angeles Harbor during heavy storms.
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Reporter Jeremy Schwartz can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 5074, or at jschwartz@peninsuladailynews.com.
