The finals day are coming soon for the old Woodrow Wilson Bridge, as transportation officials prepare to shift southbound traffic along the rust-covered span to its shinier, taller sibling this weekend.
Once again, transportation officials are warning of massive delays as the Inner Loop of Interstate 495 is squeezed down to a single lane across the 45-year-old span beginning around 8 p.m. today. The final batch of drivers are expected to cross the old bridge sometime Saturday, officials said, and preparation to demolish it will begin immediately.
Yet, the relatively smooth shift of traffic on the Outer Loop last month does not mean drivers should ignore the warnings, officials said Thursday. Project spokesman John Undeland said the Inner Loop shift has more challenges, which means unless drivers heed warnings, there could be hours-long delays.
Undeland said the Inner Loop has 13 percent more traffic than the Outer Loop. He also stressed because Interstate 95 is such a great distance from the Maryland side of the bridge, they will not be able to divert traffic as they did on the Virginia side.
A similar squeeze last year peaked at three-hour delays stretching more than seven miles — and this weekend could be worse, Undeland said.
“It’s not going to be a happy place,” Undeland added, saying people shouldn’t grow tired of the warnings and ignore them. “They are very, very real.”
Undeland said construction crews will begin to dismantle portions of the old span over the next few months and expect to detonate most of the steel structure on the Virginia side of the drawbridge by early September. The drawbridge and the Maryland side of the bridge will remain until next year and be used as a staging ground for construction of the second six-lane span.
Officials said the footprint of the second span, at Jones Point Park in Alexandria, is almost exactly the same footprint of the old bridge, which needs to be removed before construction can begin. Officials expect to open the second span and complete most of the other ramps and interchanges included in the $2.44 billion bridge project by 2008.
