10 years later: Reduction in collisions, traffic jams thanks to newest Tacoma Narrows bridge

Time flies when traffic is flowing smoothly.

The newest Tacoma Narrows bridge will celebrate its 10th anniversary Saturday, and though many drivers many not feel like celebrating the eastbound tolls, the benefits of the additional bridge are noteworthy.

The newest bridge is technically the third Tacoma Narrows bridge, counting the infamous Galloping Gertie of 1940. The bridge opened July 15, 2007 to eastbound state Route 16 traffic heading to Tacoma and beyond, while the existing bridge — built to replace Galloping Gertie in 1950 — now carries traffic westbound on SR-16.

Notable improvements thanks to the newest bridge include better traffic flow and decreased traffic collisions, said Claudia Bingham Baker, communications manager for the Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT), which manages the bridge.

“Most traffic is moving at or above speed in both directions at morning and evening peak hours. That is a dramatic improvement from when we opened the bridge in 2007,” Bingham Baker said. “We have also seen a noticeable downtrend in the frequency of traffic collisions … there did tend to be crossover traffic collisions on the old bridge.”

A slight increase in traffic volume has been noted over the past decade, with 2007 seeing 86,000 vehicles per day and last year recording 88,000 daily vehicles.

“The (traffic) volumes have stayed pretty stable throughout the last ten years,” she said.

With the flow of traffic moving more smoothly and traveling across the bridge now safer without the danger of a head-on collision, Gig Harbor has seen a variety of development as a result, said Ron Williams, Gig Harbor city administrator.

“The second (Tacoma) Narrows bridge stimulated significant development in Gig Harbor in a variety of ways,” he said. “We’ve seen a stimulation of housing growth, retail growth and services growth — a wide variety of services that have grown here.”

With many residents looking to avoid crossing the bridge, more retail shops, restaurants and entertainment options have been constructed in Gig Harbor. Other services added to the area include the Tom Taylor Family YMCA and the CHI Franciscan St. Anthony Hospital.

“Traffic backups were horrendous before they built (the bridge). Those disappeared almost immediately when the bridge was built,” Williams said. “I believe that because those traffic backups went away they likely stimulated more residential development in Gig Harbor.”

Because of the traffic decrease, many more people thought of Gig Harbor as a viable place to live and commute to work from, Williams said, especially with the additional safety of one-way traffic on the bridges.

“Now it’s a very comfortable experience, especially on the new bridge,” he said.

This story was originally published July 12, 2017 at 2:38 PM with the headline "10 years later: Reduction in collisions, traffic jams thanks to newest Tacoma Narrows bridge."