Work on North Sammamish stretch of East Lake Sammamish Trail starts April 21
Published 10:07 am Tuesday, April 15, 2014
The gap is shrinking in King County’s 175-mile regional trail system as King County Parks begins construction on improvements to the North Sammamish segment of the East Lake Sammamish Trail.
Starting April 21, the 2.5-mile-long segment will be closed from 187th Avenue Northeast to Northeast Inglewood Hill Road.
Because of the extensive amount of work, narrow corridor, steep terrain, and limited access, this segment will be closed for approximately one year. Trail users are advised to find alternate routes around the closed portion.
Nearby East Lake Sammamish Parkway features both bike lanes and sidewalks for trail users who want to travel along the eastern shoreline of the lake and around the closed stretch of trail. For recreation, trail users are encouraged to visit other trails in King County’s 175-mile regional trail system.
The new trail will be a 12-foot-wide paved corridor with two-foot-wide soft surface shoulders on each side, enhanced intersections, clear sight lines, four fish passable culverts, retaining walls, improved drainage and landscaping.
The contractor for this project is Tri-State Construction, and the estimated cost of completing the North Sammamish segment is $6.2 million.
Funding is provided by the voter-approved 2014-19 Parks, Trails and Open Space Replacement Levy, as well as by grants from the Transportation Enhancements Program, the federal Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality Program and state Washington Wildlife and Recreation Program.
This project is the third segment of the trail to be converted from the interim soft-surface trail to the finished master-planned trail. The Redmond segment was completed in 2011, and the Issaquah segment was completed in June 2013. The South Sammamish segment will be constructed in two phases, following completion of the North Sammamish portion of the trail.
King County purchased the 11-mile-long East Lake Sammamish rail banked corridor in 1998. An interim soft-surface trail was completed and opened to the public in 2006.
The trail follows a historic railroad route along the eastern shore of Lake Sammamish within the cities of Redmond, Sammamish and Issaquah. Part of the “Locks to Lakes Corridor,” the trail follows an off-road corridor along the lake and through lakeside communities.
Once the trail is fully developed, it will be part of a 44-mile-long regional urban trail corridor from Seattle’s Ballard neighborhood to Issaquah.
