ROAD REPORT: Chip-sealing coming to downtown Moses Lake next week

MOSES LAKE — Chip-sealing is scheduled to begin in the downtown area of Moses Lake sometime during the week of Sept. 15.  

East Hill Avenue and sections of East Wheeler Road are being chip-sealed this week. Drivers should be prepared for temporary detours and traffic control while chip-sealing is underway.

Sections of West Third, West Fourth and West Fifth avenues between South Pioneer Way and West Broadway Avenue will have a coat of chip-seal added, along with connecting streets between Holly and Chestnut streets. A roundabout is planned for the intersection of Wheeler Road and Road L Northeast. 

Total cost is about $1.4 million. 

Traffic revisions are planned for most of the project area once the chip-sealing is finished. Sections of West Third, West Fourth and West Fifth avenues that are now two lanes in each direction will be reduced to one lane in each direction with a left turn lane added. The exception to traffic revisions is East Wheeler Road east of State Route 17 which will remain two lanes in each direction. 

Roadwork season has about six weeks left, and many projects are still underway: 

• They’re pouring concrete at the site of a new roundabout at the intersection of State Route 26 and South First Avenue in Othello.  

Road crews will be working on the project from 7 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Monday through Friday through mid-October. Project cost is about $3.2 million.  

Drivers will be able to cross SR 26 from South First Avenue to State Route 24 (South Broadway Avenue in Othello), which now requires a detour via Columbia Street.  

Drivers should be prepared for temporary traffic signals and one-way alternating traffic through the intersection. Traffic restrictions will remain in place before and after working hours. 

Once the project is completed Columbia and Wahluke streets will be converted to two-way streets, according to the DOT website. 

• Work is progressing on Interstate 90 in the Moses Lake area; as drivers know, the road has been repaved between the Dodson Road intersection and the Moses Lake intersection at MP 161.  

Crews are still working to the east. Mae Valley to Road O NE is being repaved in both eastbound and westbound lanes. It’s the first year of a two-year project to repave sections of I-90 from the Vantage Bridge to Road O Northeast. Total project cost is $22 million.