The winding Sammamish avenue called “Snake Hill Road” will close this weekend for annual maintenance.

City crews will seal cracks and clear ditches, shoulders and drainage structures on 212th Way Southeast from East Lake Sammamish Parkway Southeast to Southeast 35th Street Feb. 20-21 from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m.

“This road, as it exists today, requires way too much maintenance,” City Manager Lyman Howard said in a city statement. “The rehabilitation project later this year is going to stabilize and improve the roadway so we can keep it open year around and don’t have to deal with chronic, short-term fixes.”

The overall improvement project, which has been in development since 2014, will cost $9 million, according to the city. Until construction can begin on the roadway, one of three main southern routes used to access the plateau, “maintenance is necessary to keep the important corridor safe,” according to a city press release. The city estimates 5,000 vehicles use the 212th connection on a typical weekday.

“The scope of the project is to repair the roadway in order to stabilize the outside edge,” city engineer Andrew Zagars told the Reporter in June 2015. “The roadway slope will be excavated and replaced with a reinforced earth backfill. The roadway will be reconstructed with wider shoulders but no sidewalk or designated bike lanes.”

In 2014, the City Council awarded a design contract to Gray and Osborne Inc. for $448,000. The design is nearly finished; the city is on schedule to request for bids later this spring, Zagars said.

In June 2015, the council authorized the purchase of two parcels along 212th Way SE for $130,000.

“In order to repair the roadway we will be constructing some retaining walls. Many of the walls will be impacting either critical areas or their buffers. We will also be required to collect and treat storm water runoff from the roadway,” then city Public Works Director Laura Philpot told the Reporter. “The property will provide space to do all of that.”

That property could also serve as a staging area for the city’s contractor, Philpot said. After the project is complete, the city could sell any unused area for future building or it could use it as a mitigation area for other transportation improvement projects, she said.

Construction is on schedule to begin in the summer, closing the road likely until the fall, Zagars said.

City crews will put signage up alerting drivers of the closure and of detours once work begins.