Highway From Coulee City to Soap Lake to Get Major Facelift

SR-17 (State Route) is a heavily traveled stretch of road between Coulee City and Soap Lake in Grant County.  Now, the hillsides will be getting a major facelift or removal. A lot of this, and other hillsides, will be gone by later this year.

  WSDOT plans to remove a lot of the hillsides.

The Washington State Department of Transportation says in about two weeks, major hillside work will be done on a stretch of SR-17 that travels along Soap Lake.

The nine-mile hillside project will be between mileposts 76 and 85, along the lake. WSDOT says many of the hillsides are so close to the shoulder of the road, that there's virtually no room to pull off in case of emergency.

There are also growing concerns about erosion and possible rocks and debris falling onto the road. Workers, beginning in mid-February, will begin trimming the hillsides and adding protective netting to prevent debris from breaking loose.

Get our free mobile app

The work will result in some one-lane travel, so there will be delays, done in increments of 15 minutes of single-lane travel each way. This will be in effect soon. Here's more from WSDOT via their Facebook:

" Expect lane and highway closures, including four weekdays that will have a full highway closure. Those have not been scheduled yet. During the first phase, the road will be open for 15 minutes at the start of every hour starting at 8:15am through 5pm Monday through Friday."

The work is slated to begin in a few weeks.