Sal on SR 167 Northbound: Tacoma to Renton
By WithBy
Categories: Society & Culture, Places & Travel
The history, landmarks, and stories along SR 167 northbound from Tacoma to Renton, timed to the drive interchange by interchange. Spoken by Sal and Peggy.
16 episodes indexed on PodSearch.
Recent episodes
- Interstate Four-Oh-Five — Renton's Own Space Needle
Sal: Between Interstate Four-Oh-Five and the end of the road. Sal: The interchange with Interstate Four-Oh-Five was overloaded for years. Voters rejected a larger overhaul in 2002, a flyover ramp was added in 2003, and from 2016 to 2019 a direct connection between the toll lanes and the carpool…
- South One-Eightieth Street — Built in Twenty-Eight Days
Sal: Between South One-Eightieth Street and Interstate Four-Oh-Five. Sal: Near here, at Renton Junction, stood Longacres, the home of thoroughbred racing in Western Washington from 1933. Its site, a 107-acre dairy farm, was found by Warren Magnuson, then a state senator and later a United States…
- South Two-Twelfth Street — The Wagon Wheel
Sal: Between South Two-Twelfth Street and South One-Eightieth Street. Sal: The freeway follows the edge of the Green River Valley here, with the industrial area on one side and the neighborhoods of Benson Hill and East Hill on the other. Sal: Some of what the valley built reached the Moon. The…
- Central Avenue — Kent Gets a Library
Sal: Between Central Avenue and South Two-Twelfth Street. Sal: Kent station, a block from Central Avenue, has 996 parking stalls and two platforms joined by a pedestrian overpass. Sal: In 1919, with the town approaching two thousand people, a local doctor, George MacGregor, whose wife had been a…
- Willis Street — Hops, Then Lettuce
Sal: Between Willis Street and Central Avenue. Sal: Here the freeway crosses the Green River at downtown Kent and passes the accesso ShoWare Center arena and the Maleng Regional Justice Center. Sal: Kent began as White River, then Titusville, after an early settler named James Henry Titus. In the…
- South Two Seventy-Seventh Street — Just Plain Washington
Sal: Between South Two Seventy-Seventh Street and Willis Street. Sal: In 2016, this was the busiest spot on the whole highway: an average of 129,000 vehicles a day at South Two Seventy-Seventh Street. Sal: It was once the town of Thomas, now a ghost town on the Green River. It was named for John…
- Fifteenth Street Northwest — Horses and Trolleys
Sal: Between Fifteenth Street Northwest and South Two Seventy-Seventh Street. Sal: Through here the freeway runs along Mill Creek and the Interurban Trail, north of downtown Auburn, passing the Emerald Downs racetrack and Auburn Municipal Airport. Sal: The airport is also called Dick Scobee Field…
- State Route Eighteen — Once Called Slaughter
Sal: Between State Route Eighteen and Fifteenth Street Northwest. Sal: State Route Eighteen began as the Echo Lake Cutoff, a two-lane road chosen to avoid Tiger Mountain and connect Tacoma to Snoqualmie Pass. Its first section, from Highway Ninety-Nine to Auburn, opened on December 19, 1958. After…
- Fifteenth Street Southwest — The Supermall
Sal: Between Fifteenth Street Southwest and State Route Eighteen. Sal: The Outlet Collection opened in August 1995 as the Supermall of the Great Northwest. In its first year it had 175 stores and drew more than 14 million customers. By 1998, one fifth of the stores had closed. Peggy: Super for…
- Ellingson Road — Valley of Flowers
Sal: Between Ellingson Road and Fifteenth Street Southwest. Sal: The town beside this junction was first known as Valley City. A 1907 classified ad in the Seattle Times called it "the new place on Tacoma Interurban." When a post office opened in 1909, the name had to change, to avoid confusion…
- Eighth Street — Pacific City
Sal: Between Eighth Street and Ellingson Road. Sal: This is Pacific, a small city that straddles the line between King and Pierce counties. The first sign of a town here was a newspaper story. On June 10, 1906, the Seattle Times reported that more than 3,000 acres in the White River Valley had…
- Twenty-Fourth Street East — The River Moved
Sal: Between Twenty-Fourth Street East and Eighth Street. Sal: The freeway runs under a bluff along the west side of the White River Valley here, and the rivers of this valley are not where they used to be. The Stuck River, reportedly called "Stax," meaning "plowed through," by local Native…
- State Route Four-Ten — The Ryan House
Sal: Between State Route Four-Ten and Twenty-Fourth Street East. Sal: The freeway makes a long curve along the Puyallup River in Sumner and meets the western end of State Route Four-Ten, close to the city's train station. That station keeps the valley's hop history alive. Its platforms have three…
- State Route Five-Twelve — Lost, Then Found
Sal: Between State Route Five-Twelve and State Route Four-Ten. Sal: State Route Five-Twelve meets this freeway at a trumpet interchange, and it gives Puyallup a freeway bypass of Interstate Five, out to Lakewood. The towns along this valley, between Puyallup and Renton, grew up in the late…
- North Meridian — Very Long Girders
Sal: Between North Meridian and State Route Five-Twelve. Sal: This is the south end of the State Route One Sixty-Seven freeway, which shares its lanes for a short way with State Route One Sixty-One. The plan is a new freeway from Puyallup, across Interstate Five, to State Route Five-Oh-Nine in…
- Interstate Five — Domes, Hops, Fords
Sal: Between Interstate Five and North Meridian. Sal: This end of State Route One Sixty-Seven sits beside the Emerald Queen Casino, near the headquarters of the Puyallup Tribe, a short way from the Tacoma Dome. Tacoma did not get its dome easily. Voters turned down a domed stadium in 1967, in…
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