Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) Secretary Paula Hammond joined WSDOT Olympic Region Administrator Kevin Dayton, Tacoma Mayor Bill Baarsma, and more than 100 students from Holy Rosary School cut a ribbon Monday before walking as a group across the new Delin Street overpass that spans Interstate 5, and is near Holy Rosary Church.
“It’s fitting that we are surrounded by Holy Rosary students for this ribbon-cutting,” said Secretary Hammond. “The community shared in the challenges and they should share in the success. We want to give the neighborhoods and community groups a lot of thanks for their support and patience throughout this project.”
While the project continues into the spring, the opening of the new Delin Street overpass presented an opportunity to cut a ribbon and involve the local community in the event. Holy Rosary Church’s Father Robert Goebel, S.J., offered a blessing during the event.
Doubling the width of Pierce County’s busiest section of highway came loaded with challenges for the hundreds of workers whose ingenuity, skill, sweat and tears made it happen, according to WSDOT. Those challenges weren’t exclusive to the workers, as drivers, local residents, businesses, schools and churches adjusted to the detours and the din of a two-and-a-half-year construction project stretching from the Tacoma Mall to the Tacoma Dome.
Monday’s event celebrated the on-time, on-budget accomplishments of the work crews and the safety and mobility benefits produced by the freeway improvements. At the same time, WSDOT recognized its partners and the local people whose daily lives were affected by the $72.9 million I-5, 48th Street to Pacific Avenue project.
For more information about the 48th Street to Pacific Avenue project, or other projects that are part of the Tacoma/Pierce County HOV Program, visit http://www.tacomatraffic.com/ .