Westbound I-90 in Eastgate is back to its old and familiar look!

You waited patiently, you asked nicely, now your wish has been granted. Westbound I-90 is back to its original look in Bellevue!

On Friday, June 13, we reopened westbound I-90 in the Eastgate neighborhood after multiple nights of closures. Since early last year, the HOV/carpool lane just west of the Eastgate Park and Ride/142nd Place Southeast was closed, and traffic shifted northward while we built a new bridge for the I-90 Sunset Creek fish passage project. Now that that work is done, we reopened the HOV/carpool lane and shifted traffic back, which should ease some of the backups travelers have been dealing with.

But that’s not all: We also reopened the westbound I-90 HOV on-ramp from 142nd Place Southeast too, allowing access from the Eastgate Park and Ride and nearby Bellevue College. Check out the before and after in the photos below!

A WSDOT DOTCAM picture shows westbound I-90 in the Eastgate neighborhood of Bellevue, with the HOV lane closed off behind a concrete barrier next to a lot of construction equipment and vehicles in the median. The HOV on-ramp from 142nd Place Southeast is also closed off. There are only four lanes of traffic. This is before construction that took place last week.

An after photo shows westbound I-90 in Eastgate after traffic shifted back to its original configuration, with a reopened HOV/carpool lane. There are now five lanes of traffic instead of four, which was the case since early 2024. The 142nd Place Southeast HOV on-ramp to westbound I-90 has also reopened. Construction equipment and vehicles remain in the median.

There’s still plenty of work to be done- work continues along eastbound I-90 through the same area, with bridge construction scheduled to finish sometime next year. Southeast Eastgate Way remains closed until the end of the year. We appreciate your patience as we work to replace replace culverts that block fish passage on Sunset Creek, allowing natural stream conditions to return in this section of the waterway and opening new upstream habitat to native and migrating fish!