On Sept 13, Northeast 124th Street between 124th Avenue Northeast and 120th Place Northeast will be closed from 10 pm to 6 am the following day, while crews erect the Totem Lake Connector bridge spanning over Northeast 124th Street.

The Totem Lake Connector will be a bicycle and pedestrian bridge that will connect the two ends of the 5.75-mile Cross Kirkland Corridor currently split by one of Kirkland’s most complicated intersections – Totem Lake Boulevard and Northeast 124th Street.

The over $22 million project has been under construction since December 2020 and is expected to be completed by Spring 2023. The project has been in design and planning since 2017.

As it is now, the intersection creates a premature dead-end to the Cross Kirkland Corridor on the South side of the intersection, severing it from the Village at Totem Lake and separating a quarter-mile section of trail on its North side.

The bridge will connect these two ends, linking Kirkland to the mall and in the process, making possible an alternative transportation corridor that will eventually extend from Renton to Woodinville, according to the city.

The Totem Lake Connector is also the largest infrastructure investment proposed in the City’s interactive “Suggest a Project,” the internet-based system that has accumulated more than 500 transportation-related suggestions. Eighty percent of those suggestions ask for projects that would protect residents from cars, such as sidewalks, crosswalks, bike lanes and traffic calming devices.

The City of Kirkland says they are providing a series of transportation solutions that will give people more options over how they navigate the urban center as the city observes growth, especially in the Totem Lake area.