(Pictured: With nothing like the congestion it has today, Interstate 5 between Tacoma and Everett was completed and opened in 1967. The cars and a bus pictured here, with the Space Needle in the distant background, were among the earliest to put the new freeway to use. Photo credit: Historylink.org)
TIME & AGAIN
By Phil Dougherty
On May 14, 1969, the final segment of Interstate 5 in Washington opened for traffic. The $9.8 million section of freeway ran four miles between Marysville and Everett in Snohomish County, and included 11 bridges. With its opening, motorists could travel without stopping from the Canadian border to the northern California state line.
As the automobile gained traction in America during the early 20th century, so did a network of expanding highways across the U.S. Individual states handled road construction, and though the federal government provided matching funds in many cases, it still was not enough to fund sufficient construction to keep up with the soaring numbers of automobiles. By the 1950s, bigger and better highways were needed, and in 1956 the federal government became more involved in funding them through the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956, which provided 90 percent funding for a nationwide network of high-speed, limited-access roads. This led to the beginning of Interstate 5 in Washington.
The first segment of I-5 formally opened in Tacoma in December 1960, and despite some protests, construction proceeded through the decade. In January 1967, the final section from Everett to Tacoma was completed, linking the greater Seattle metropolitan area.
Altogether, the construction of the original I-5 through Washington, Oregon and California cost about $2.3 billion and took most of the 1960s and 1970s to finish.
The completion of the freeway in Washington was marked with a ceremony that was fairly typical for freeway openings during the 1960s. Various dignitaries attended the late-morning ceremony, which was held on the new Steamboat Slough Bridge just south of Marysville. State highway commissioner Harold Walsh of Everett served as the master of ceremonies, Miss Marysville of 1968, Katherine Smith, snipped the ceremonial ribbon. Everyone was all smiles.
The last traffic light on the freeway (located on temporary I-5 at Walnut Street in Everett) between Canada and California was symbolically taken down when the new segment of freeway opened at 11 a.m. District engineer Bob Roberts, representing the state highway department employees, presented highway director Charles Prahl with the light at a luncheon at the Everett Elks Club after the ribbon-cutting ceremony. Prahl, who was resigning his position effective June 1, 1969, used the occasion to slam those who had criticized the freeway construction, arguing in his speech, “We all recognize that cities need rapid transit, but people are not going to give up their automobiles, at least not for the next 15 or 20 years. The anti-highway people in the Seattle area are enjoying the freeways we have built, but at the same time are complaining we shouldn’t build any more.”
Source: Historylink.org, a non-profit online history of Washington. This article was originally published in 2010.