Traffic accidents spike along Washington bridge detour routes
Mount Vernon, WA, one of the communities impacted by the Skagit River Bridge collapse caused when a semi truck’s oversized load struck the span, has seen a huge uptick in traffic accidents due to detours around the closed span.
Mount Vernon had 75 crashes the first week after the bridge collapse, and police found that 26 of those wrecks were directly tied to detours around the bridge, according to a KOMO News report.
The Washington State Department of Transportation hopes to start moving the first part of the temporary bridge into place starting this week, but that also means drivers through the area still face up to two weeks of detours and troublesome traffic.
“I’ve never seen so many trucks in my life going past this place,” said Denise Skelton, a Mount Vernon resident.
