Seward Highway project meeting held in Girdwood
Meeting participants visit the stations during the open house stage of the meeting. (Photo by Chase Berenson)
By Chase Berenson
TNews Staffwriter
On Tuesday, January 13th, Girdwood residents met with representatives of the Alaska Department of Transportation (DOT) and their consultants HDR and Michael Baker International to discuss the Safer Seward Highway project. This is a massive infrastructure project that would dramatically reimagine the Seward Highway between mileposts 98.5 and 118, or approximately from Bird Flats in the south to Rabbit Creek in the north. In December 2025 the DOT published the draft Environmental Assessment (EA), and this meeting allowed the public to comment on the assessment.
The Safer Seward Highway project is a construction project that is predicted to cost $1.4 billion and to take 15-20 years of work. This project will convert the road into a four-lane divided highway, like the Glenn Highway between Anchorage and Wasilla. This project will straighten out the curves of the highway by blasting rock walls and cliffs, will destroy over 300 acres of wildlife habitat, and will fill in 101 acres of mudflats to provide space to expand the Alaska Railroad tracks and the Seward Highway itself. The Environmental Assessment states that the project may entail highway closures for construction for some period of the day that may take place daily over the 15-20 years of construction.
The DOT’s goals with the project are threefold: reduce crashes, increase mobility/reliability, and accommodate mixed-use in the highway right-of-way. It approaches these goals by expanding the highway to be safer, which the DOT claims should reduce accident-related closures and make the highway more reliable. The project also includes a multi-use pathway from the northern end of the Bird-to-Gird all the way to Anchorage, accommodating pedestrians and bicyclists who want to connect Anchorage and Girdwood without using the highway.
The Seward Highway has been one of the DOT’s four “safety corridors” in the state since 2006. This project started in 2023 with project scoping and stakeholder working groups to provide highway feedback; one of the stakeholders involved was the Girdwood Board of Supervisors. The DOT spent 2024 working on the Environmental Assessment and published the EA in 2025.
Station four of the open house stage of the meeting. (Photo by Chase Berenson)
The meeting started with an open-house style exhibit that was separated into seven stations that participants explored. The first station was titled “About the Project” and introduced participants to the basics of the project, including the project purpose and the alternatives to the project that were considered. Station two included a very large map of the Seward Highway which participants could walk along and see the detailed location of various elements of the project. Station three was titled “Proposed Action Details” and described what’s included in the project, such as highway reconstruction, rock cuts, railroad realignment, and the addition of a non-motorized path to extend the Bird-to-Gird all the way to Anchorage. Station four was “Draft EA Impact Highlights” and showcased impacts on topics such as birds, Dall sheep, beluga whales, historical sites, and the Chugach State Park. Station five was “What’s Next for the Overall Project” and included information and timelines about moving the project forward. Station six was a station for providing public comment, and the final station was a kid’s station with coloring books and other children’s activities.
The meeting transitioned into a presentation format, which allowed the project team from the DOT and the consultants to explain more detail about the elements of the project.
Finally, the meeting concluded with an opportunity for public testimony about the project. There were six members of the public from Girdwood and Bird who took the opportunity to testify about the project, and the public testimony was fairly evenly split: three people spoke in favor of the project, two spoke against the project, and one speaker was neutral.
The project is scheduled to start in summer 2026 with two smaller elements that have been deemed highest priority and most shovel-ready: the construction of a left turn lane for cars entering the McHugh Creek parking lot and icefall mitigation work north of McHugh Creek.
The public comment period continues until Thursday, February 12th, 2026. Information about the project can be found on the Safer Seward Highway website at https://safersewardhighway.com/, which includes the draft Environmental Assessment document and multiple methods for providing public comment.
The project area, from a slide presented during the presentation stage of the meeting. (Slide Presentation Photo by Chase Berenson)
A preliminary rendering of what the Seward Highway may look like at Bird Creek after the project is completed, from a slide presented during the presentation stage of the meeting. (Slide Presentation Photo by Chase Berenson)