A concrete culvert off to the left of this main entrance is the escape hatch from the shelter’s emergency exit tunnel.

Below and just west of the underpass along Weedin Place, a landscaped concrete pathway leads from the sidewalk to a distinctive high and slightly curved concrete wall, with a metal door and grate. During the construction of I-5, the shelter was built into the area beneath the southbound lanes of the freeway where it crosses Weedin Place, just east of Green Lake and just north of the University District, around 68th Street in North Seattle.Īn odd-looking concrete box that’s visible from I-5 is the shelter’s air vent and is the only indication to freeway drivers that this isn’t a typical overpass. The shelter, with its 15-inch thick concrete walls, dates to 1963 and is kitty-corner from the old John Marshall School. “So it wasn’t designed to survive a direct nuclear strike on Seattle.” “It’s a pretty minimal shelter, and it’s not actually a bomb shelter, it’s a fallout shelter,” Williams told KIRO Radio. He oversees the state’s historically significant highways and bridges, and, yes, its one-of-a-kind fallout shelter. Scott Williams is the manager of the Washington State Department of Transportation’s Cultural Resources Program.

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