Homer's tsunami evacuation route is being raised and widened

If a tsunami warning goes out in Homer, the people on the Spit are told to drive inland on Homer Spit Road, turn east onto Kachemak Drive and keep going to East End Road. That stretch is about to be rebuilt.

The Federal Highway Administration has put roughly $1.17 million toward reconstructing Kachemak Drive from the Sterling Highway intersection to East End Road, a distance of three and a half miles. The work would raise and widen the road to make it easier to get out on, whether by vehicle or on foot, and includes drainage, utility and roadside work. It runs through the end of 2027.

Most of the money comes from a federal resilience program aimed at protecting roads from hazards like this one, and carries no state share. The state has the full project programmed at $6.65 million in its transportation plan, with the federal government covering all of it.

Kachemak Drive is one of three marked tsunami evacuation routes in Homer, signed in blue and white. Federal records call it Kachemak Bay Drive; the city's own guidance calls it Kachemak Drive.