Interstate 82

Interstate 82

Interstate 82 is an Interstate Highway in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It runs 144 miles from its northwestern terminus at I-90 in Ellensburg, Washington, to I-84 in Hermiston, Oregon. The highway passes through Yakima and the Tri-Cities, and is also part of the link between Seattle and Boise, Idaho. The federal government created I-82 in late 1957 to serve military facilities in the region.

About Interstate 82 in brief

Summary Interstate 82Interstate 82 is an Interstate Highway in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It runs 144 miles from its northwestern terminus at I-90 in Ellensburg, Washington, to I-84 in Hermiston, Oregon. The highway passes through Yakima and the Tri-Cities, and is also part of the link between Seattle and Boise, Idaho. The federal government created I-82 in late 1957 to serve military facilities in the region, replacing an earlier designation for what is now I- 84. The most heavily trafficked and the least trafficked sections of I- 82 are located in Washington; the busiest section is in downtown Yakima near SR 24, which carried a daily average of 52,000 vehicles in 2016. In 2016, ODOT’s measurements of average daily traffic ranged from a maximum of 13,700 vehicles at Powerline Road near Hermiston to 21,700 at the Umatilla Bridge at the end of the highway. I-72 is a component of the Interstate Highway System and is designated as an important national highway under the National Highway System. It is also listed as a Highway of Statewide Significance by the Washington state government. It also has two child state highways in Washington: State Route 821 that runs from Selah to Ellensberg, and SR 823 that Runs from Yakima to Selah. The four-lane divided highway forms part of a link betweenSeattle and the inland West, which includes Boise, Boise and Salt Lake City, Utah.

It has one auxiliary route, I-182, a spur route that serves the tri-city area of Richland and Pasco in Washington. The freeway climbs the Manastash Ridge traveling southeastward around the Yakima Valley, traveling around the southern edge of the Kittitas Valley. It travels southward in a concurrency with US 97, which travels around the southeast edge of Yakima, and US 12, which continues around the south edge of Kittitas Canyon. It turns south to cross the Columbia River on the UMatilla Bridge, which separates Yakima from the Kittita Valley. The last section of the interstate to be constructed was the easterly bypass of Yakima, which opened in 1963. The Yakima valley section, connecting Union Gap to Prosser, was constructed between 1977 and 1982. The final section of Interstate 82 in Oregon was completed in 1988. In the early 2000s, Oregon highway officials examined plans to extend I-83 further south through eastern Oregon and towards California, but they were not considered for further study. In 1973, Oregon and Washington adopted a federal compromise to build I-92 through Umatillas and around the outskirts of the Tri -Cities with a spur routes to serve the area directly. In 1986,  I-82 opened in 1986 while in Oregon, the final section opened in 1988, and  the Tri- Cities section opened in 1987.