Gravelly Lake Dr SW in Lakewood between Nyanza and Veterans will be closed to through traffic starting June 1 through February 2022.
Gravelly Lake Dr to close June 1
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What? 8 months? What could they possibly be doing to take that long? Why are they spending all this time and money putting fancy sidewalks for the rich people on Gravelly lake and in Oakbrook, yet they leave Hipkins half finished for more that a decade.
They are replacing (not just repaving) the road and installing sidewalks. Similar to what they did from Washington Blvd to Nyanza. It will benefit many more than just the “rich people on Gravelly Lake”; that stretch is a major arterial from I-5 to most of western Lakewood.
If they put round about at veterns and gravely just like the ones on veterns then everyone in Lakewood should have to take a refresher course in drive Ed there will mire jams accidents and no regard for how they work its the most wasted money project take a survey how a light people have to think a round about give everyone the gift of who cares so do a study of this and stop wasting the money stupid lakewood is really beginning to suck
I’m going to resurrect a contentious question: is Gravelly Lake a public or private lake?
I have been asking the same question. I was told it was public but there’s no way to access.
There is an access but it is unmaintained so effectively, yes there is no public access although it is a public lake
We demand to know!
Seriously I remain very curious about this. I suspect the answer is it’s technically/legally public but in practice, private.
It’s listed as essentially a private, resident access only lake. It does have two legal public access points, both of which are overgrown, and not viable for access.
J. Gordon – See my comment below about Linwood and Hilltop Lanes. Are these the ones you are referring to?
Yes it is listed as a public lake, however only the resident who live on the shore have access to it. The police will be called on you if you attempt to access this public lake.
Great. That 8 months will turn into two years knowing the pace these people went with the last project. THAT STILL ISN’T FINISHED. Work on some of that first. Oh wait, they are too busy turning every damn neighborhood into a industrial or business park.
That road is total crap and needs to be redone , from what I understand some circles will be installed to replace traffic lights ,I for one welcome the road work .
so it takes 8 months for what, 1.5 miles of road? The entire interstate system was built in a decade.
They weren’t installing new water mains, relocating power and communication lines with the freeway. Also, no sidewalks or curb on the interstate.
“The entire interstate system was built in a decade”….no flipping way. It was supposed to be completed in 10 years, but as a kid I and younger adult I travelled all over the country and I remember interstate projects being worked on at least from the 60’s through the 90’s. In fact, a quick Google says technically the last stretch wasn’t completed until 2018 – 62 years after it was started.
OK lets do your math. Lets say it took 40 years. Thats more than 1000 miles per year! And they had to build bridges too. Thats about 700 miles in 8 months, Thats 450 times faster than gravelly lake drive project.
They put a round about on veterns and gravely lake is the dumbest thing they could do just as the ones on veterns do you really think that people are gonna respect the way it works on a busy work day. How many accidents that will happen. I feel that since the did all this crazy road work people in Lake wood should have to read the drivers manual
The closure will kill business for the gas station there!
Gravelly Lake is public, but try to find access. Back in the 1950s my brother found the public access area. He parked his car and when fishing. A short time later he got a letter from L.T. Murray who owned the adjacent property threatening to take him to court for trespassing. My parents wrote back that he had done nothing wrong because it was public access area. However that’s all changed since then as the area is the gated community of Madera. The pubic access is or was in the area of the gate. Use public records to find out if you can access the lake and if not why. The lack of sufficient public access to the lakes around here is appalling.
And that’s the way the wealthy who can afford to live in these areas prefer it to remain.
I’ve always thought there are a couple of small public access roads off Nyanza that lead to the southwest shore of Gravelly Lake. Pierce County’s GIS data base in that area shows what looks like narrow strips of public property leading to the lake at the ends of Linwood Lane SW and Hilltop Lane SW. So this may still be true, at least legally. No idea what they look like on the ground. And I’ll bet there are zero parking accommodations.
Why has there not been any signage to warn people of this upcoming closure? Are all of the mobile signs in use for the other road projects happening around the city? There is signage on Steilacoom Blvd warning of delays due to utility work that also begins June 1. There is signage at Lakewood Dr letting us know that the road will be closed, weather permitting, so that they can finally finish that project. There is signage at the RR crossings telling us that there will be high speed testing to start soon. But there has been absolutely NO signage for this project that will impact so many people. Yes, we can go around the lake. But why haven’t you given people advance notice? Not everyone is on Facebook. Not everyone reads the Suburban times. And I’m sure that not everyone reads the city managers weekly report. This is not acceptable.
Because it won’t be closed for a couple more weeks. The release on the project website says only a lane closure on Tuesday.
They should do one side at at time and let some traffic through. Closing it totally off for 8 months is preposterous.
I love all of the armchair quarterbacks making comments about how this work should be done faster or differently without truly knowing what is entailed. Like a bunch of BLM activists judging police officers for their interactions with methed up criminals. If you think that you can build the thing faster, put together a crew and bid the job next time. You will make a killing. Material and equipment cost the same for each contractor, they only make money by reducing labor and getting to the next job.
Let’s just say that they have the room to get traffic through, do you think it would be faster to deal with traffic while building the thing, or faster for you to drive through the construction with flaggers stopping you for what seems like forever? 8 months will turn into 10-12 months and you will find that it’ll be faster to drive around than sit at the flagger.
What is preposterous, are the uninformed, couch warriors going off about things that they have obviously never done.