Any expansion is several years away, but preliminary planning for the project is under way.
In the past four years, traffic along a two-mile stretch of Yakima exits has grown from 36,000 vehicles a day to 41,000 vehicles a day, a transportation study showed. But it's nothing compared with the volume of cars found on other sections of freeway in the state. On average, the Interstate 5 intersection with Interstate 90 in Seattle has 264,000 vehicles a day.