Architect Suggests Replacement of Iconic Seattle Bridge Should be a Hybrid Design

The Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) is just under 3-months away from deciding what to do with one of Seattle’s most iconic bridges. Will it be repair or replace? One architect, Matthias Olt, with B+H Architects, whose firm didn’t apply to be part of the official process to pick a consultant to work on a potential replacement, said, “We think the bridge is such an iconic thing in Seattle, someone should be a voice at the table for design.” But Olt is not pushing the design, so much as how and what the new bridge should be constructed of. Olt is proposing a hybrid bridge – part steel or carbon fiber, wrapped in wood, Northwest-grown timber to be specific, with concrete piers. The arches in the arch design would be made of steel. The hybrid material could be half the weight of concrete.