PORT TOWNSEND – State Department of Transportation officials have an alternative transportation plan rolling so that North Olympic Peninsula residents can get around Hood Canal Bridge when it closes May-June 2009 for replacement of the eastern half.
Becky Hixson, Hood Canal Bridge project communications manager, said Thursday that a “medical bus” will be part of the plan.
“From our research, it was determined that about 10 percent of those surveyed use the bridge to get access to Seattle for medical appointments,” said Hixson.
Those with medical appointments at bridge-closure time will be able to call to make reservations, Hixson said.
Those needing the medical bus will, like others, be required to drive or take Clallam Transit or Jefferson Transit to a 1,500-space park-and-ride lot to be built in 2008 at the Fred Hill Materials Shine pit near Hood Canal and state Highway 104.
From there, the medical bus riders and others will be shuttled to South Point, south of state Highway 104 on the bridge’s west end, to catch the water shuttle to Port Gamble, where another 1,500-vehicle park-and-ride facility will be built.
Transportation will staff both park-and-ride lots, which will also have plenty of light, said Hixson.
“From Port Gamble, the medical bus would meet the parties, with some stopping points on the way to Bainbridge,” Hixson explained.
“They will pay for a ferry ride and then the shuttle picks them up on Seattle side.”
There will be five medical shuttles runs a day, she said, and they will likely run mornings and afternoons.
No specific times will be scheduled and those making reservations will be told when they can take the medical bus, she said.
Shuttle schedules will not be determined until Jefferson, Clallam and Kitsap transit systems make their schedules available in 2009, according to Hixson.
“Since we’ve gotten the water shuttle determined, the transit proposals are almost complete,” she said, adding that Jefferson, Clallam and Kitsap transits were all involved.
