Thursday, October 20, 2011 - Page updated at 11:37 a.m.

Live chat: The 9-day closure of the Alaskan Way Viaduct

The nine-day closure of the Alaskan Way Viaduct will be the longest ever for a Seattle-area highway. Traffic delays will ripple to Interstate 5 and even the Eastside's Interstate 405. Join transportation reporter Mike Lindblom for a live chat at noon on Thursday, Oct. 20, to talk about potential traffic impacts and detours during the nine-day closure, as well as other ways to get around. Mike also will take questions about the state's project to build a stadium-area interchange and a tunnel to South Lake Union, which is expected to be completed by the start of 2016. Submit questions in advance of the chat, or ask them on Twitter using the hashtag #viadoom.

The worst effects will be in areas such as SeaTac, Burien, White Center and West Seattle along the Highway 99 corridor, which includes the viaduct. Congestion will also be heavy at South Lake Union, where traffic entering from the city's north side must exit before the Battery Street Tunnel.

Mike Lindblom, Seattle Times transportation reporter

Mike lives in West Seattle and has been a news writer in Washington state for 22 years, covering transportation at The Seattle Times since 2002. Growing up in Seattle, he rode in the back of a pickup truck at 70 mph in the early years of I-5, rode the Metro 358 bus to high school, and jumped off the unfinished Arboretum ramps of Highway 520. During #viadoom, he plans to sample all modes of travel -- bus, car, bicycle, foot-ferry, and maybe backtracking to a Tukwila commuter train. Find him on Twitter at @MikeLindblom.