As I’ve stated before, I tend to agree that a tunnel option for replacing the Alaska Way Viaduct is politically dead… but I can’t help but thinking. The state rejected Mayor Nickels’ recent four-lane hybrid tunnel-lite proposal, arguing that using the shoulders as exit lanes during peak traffic would be unsafe. So… why not just eliminate the exits altogether?
Stick with me here.
We keep hearing that 99 is a vital North/South thruway, and thus the governor insists that she won’t support any option that reduces capacity. Yet if the Viaduct is bounded by a surface street to the South and the four-lane Battery St. tunnel to the North, then obviously much of the traffic must be local.
So instead of talking about a “viaduct” why not consider a “bypass” — a two-mile, four-lane tunnel through the downtown waterfront that eliminates the northbound exits and southbound entrances at Seneca and Western? This way all that vital N/S traffic can continue to flow N/S, while local traffic is diverted to improved surface streets.
Without the need for extra wide shoulders, or the cost of building four ramps, the “hybrid bypass” solution would be even cheaper than Nickels’ tunnel-lite, while ensuring that thru-traffic travels along the waterfront faster than it does today. And local drivers that would have used the existing exits would be served by improved surface streets and transit options, unburdened by the need to accommodate existing N/S thru-traffic.
Yeah, maybe I’m just talking out of my ass. But one of things that has always annoyed me about the current debate is the total lack of imagination. Surface-plus-transit option? That’s just for hippy-dippy whackos. A “gold-plated” tunnel? It’s an unaffordable gift to developers. We’ve had a double-decker freeway running through our waterfront since the earth was created, and if it’s good enough for God then it’s good enough for me, by golly. Or at least, that seems to have been the intellectual process.
Ridicule me, a man with no engineering or traffic expertise, for suggesting a hybrid bypass. But at least I’m trying to think creatively.
The shoulders are used as exit lanes in Massachusetts and New Hampshire during rush hour. I guess Moonbat!s here are worse drives than Moonbat!s there!
Sorry, I gotta side with the Guv this time. Spending billions to replace an outmoded road with one that is even smaller is just… and I’m going to be kind here… stupid.
See Scarface, that’s exactly the lack of creativity I’m talking about. You refuse to challenge assumptions.
“Yeah, maybe I’m just talking out of my ass.”
Yeah, you are, Goldy. Highway design is not your strong suit. You need shoulders for disabled vehicles to pull over onto, and for emergency vehicles to get through traffic. I’m not sure what you’re visualizing, but if you’re thinking in terms of two lanes with no shoulders, what you’ve really got is one lane with shoulders.
Roger, no, I wasn’t talking no shoulders. I’m just saying they wouldn’t have to be extra wide shoulders like in the mayor’s hybrid tunnel proposal. You save a few feet. And of course you save the costs of the four on/off ramps.
Of course, arguing specifics misses the point. I’m just suggesting that perhaps there are other options that we’re not exploring because we’re too locked into our assumptions.
@5 I have no problem with eliminating downtown on-off ramps. Traffic flow on SR-99 works better with access at the south and north ends of downtown, and through traffic between.
Years ago, I was driving south on the viaduct in the left lane, when an adjacent driver suddenly decided to take the exit near the Kingdome and executed a left turn from the center lane across my path of travel. By some miracle, I managed to swerve just enough to sideswipe her instead of slamming into her broadside and pushing us both through the rail of the exit ramp two stories to the pavement below. I got out, walked over to see if she was okay, then told her she was lucky to be alive.
If you check back on the comment threads, this is something I proposed a few days ago. Dump “downtown” traffic onto surface streets north and south of town, but have the Viaduct traffic shoot straight through town, with no exits. It really shouldn’t be a problem except on game days, when lots of people use the viaduct to try to get out of town in a hurry.
And sorry Roger, the lack of shoulders is not really a problem, becuase there ARE shoulders. The “tunnel light” option calls for two lanes each way, with a shoulder on each side which emergency vehicles can use. The only problem with the shoulders was that the “light” design called for shoulders for be used as long entrance/exit ramps during commute times – in essence, turning them into collecter/distributer lanes. If you don’t have downtown exits at the tunnel, you can still keep the shoulders, and you can probably save quite a bit of money on the project, to boot.
Personally, I’m still in favor of the full tunnel option. If you are going to build it, build it right. It’s going to be there for a long time – perhaps the next 75 or 100 years, so don’t scrimp too much. Even though I live in Everett, I would be willing to kick in another $500 or so in property taxes a year if this option were realized. I consider it an investment in an entire region.
But if we can’t get the political willpower to do it right, then my next vote is for “tunnel light”, and I do like the “no exits” plan.
If that fails, I vote for no viaduct. It’s not that I think the surface/transit option will work, I’m sure it won’t. But it will be a lot easier to build a tunnel a few years from now when we see what a mess we’ve created than it would be to tear down a new viaduct later. If we build it, we are stuck with it for the rest of our lifetimes.
@5 Goldy, as I’ve said in these threads all along, I believe SR-99 is an essential vehicle traffic corridor that Seattle can’t do without, and should be preserved.
The state has met its responsibility for maintaining the state highway by providing funds to replace the viaduct. We all recognize, I think, that undergrounding SR-99 through downtown Seattle to beautify the city is not a financial responsibility of the state. If the city wants to come up with the money for that, fine. I’ve supported a Local Improvement District encompassing the downtown property owners who will reap economic benefits from improved views and enhanced property values from the beginning. But you and I both know how these things work: the moneyed interests who buy politicians make their considerable financial investments in campaigns precisely to pass these kinds of costs to hapless and voiceless ordinary taxpayers. So a very heavy dose of suspicion about who will get stuck with the bill is warranted.
Giving the city an option to upgrade the project, and giving the city an option to eliminate the state highway, are two drastically different things. While SR-99 no longer serves its historical role of being the principal north-south arterial through the Puget Sound region for moving commerce and people, it remains an indispensable element of the region’s transportation network. The city is entitled to no say in whether there continues to be a state highway through that corridor. That is a state matter which must be based on broader interests than Seattle’s desire for downtown beautification.
The bypass alternative was considered and rejected by the state and the City when they had harmony on the big tunnel and thought, not hard enough, that we would all agree to pay for it. It could be lifted out as part of an agreement and still not delay things. But it won’t happen now because the state highway department raced to snuff the tunnel with a really biased “engineering” report in which the chief capacity boosters (and the same guys who dreamed up the original $14 billion tunnel) made their final play for their dream while ditching their integrity.
There is a win-win outcome on this provided the voters of the city reject the state’s big ugly and the tunnel hybrid. And anyone who wants to have more light rail, a 520 bridge that stays afloat, and a ton of other things had better pray the vote is NO and NO. The solutions are on the surface. They save a ton of money and a ton of risk. And they can move an adequate amount of people and cars without screwing everything else up. They cost about $2 Billion – perhaps far less if people would agree not to delay things.
The upcoming vote is very worthwhile provided people agree to proceed with a sensible surface design (not to be confused as a no build). We’ll get a high capacity boulevard that can’t fall down. And we’ll get a ton of other capacity in other parts of the city and region on roads and rails.
All other outcomes of theMarch 13 vote are lousy, will kill early action on other projects, and drive up costs by billions by the time we finally get around to them.
The NO – NO vote is just what Mayor Nickels needs to save face with the noisey capacity freaks in Ballard and other places – he will have fought the good fight by keeping traditional approaches to capacity alive. But he’ll listen to the voters. Someone will need to work on the Governor and the chief engineer who cooked up all these statements made by the Governor and the highway department about why the surface won’t work. That rhetoric is the chief cause of this whole big riff.
We need peace. We need a great city. We need to get the Viaduct fixed. And we need a better transportation system in the entire region. A NO NO vote vastly improves the odds that we’ll actually make some timely progress and won’t delay things ready-to-go at a cost of many billions.
Goldy & rhp6033-
I’m all for creativity and certainly there is nothing wrong with thinking outside of the box….but shoulder width not only provides traffic safety for stalled vehicles but it is incorporated into modeling throughput of vehicles (i.e. volume). Drivers tend to ‘slow down’ when the road constricts….that is a fact and to deny that is approaching flat-earther’s view of science. As far as actual ramification predictions, I don’t know but it has to be considered. I doubt the political will is there to fund a study to look at that (right or wrong). The tunnel is almost dead.
Don’t get me wrong, cost not considered, only a moron would reject a tunnel.
@8 Well said and I couldn’t agree more.
Nice to see agreement on issues.
Now I want to know why we can build the Tacoma Narrows project for 849 million and need 4+ billion for the 520 bridge…
http://www.wsdot.wa.gov/Projec.....efault.htm
We currently are boring tunnels under Beacon Hill,why not the waterfront? No major disruption of surface streets during construction and bored tunnels are generally cheaper than cut and cover.
Goldy,
I recently heard Tim Ceis state that Seattle looked at about 65 options before deciding on tunnel/tunnel lite. I’d love to know more about the other 60+ options they rejected. Can you find out and then write a post about all the other options? Thanks.
@12
The Narrows is narrower, silly….
Goldy,
When you said “I’m just saying they wouldn’t have to be extra wide shoulders like in the mayor’s hybrid tunnel proposal. You save a few feet. And of course you save the costs of the four on/off ramps.” you validated that furballs statement about Highway building not being your strong suit.
I have responded on many areas of I-5 and have even had a mirror clip my jacket. Now what you are proposing is shoulders that are smaller than I-5. No way in hell. Added to that, the citizens of this great Puget Sound area, have a problem with moving right for lights and sirens. I have talked to many of my brothers and sisters up there in Seattle, and they can all tell you horror stories of being honked at, flipped off and having some idiot in a Nissan tailgate them while they are going Code 3. The shoulders and barriers aren’t enough as it is.
Personally, I prefer the tunnel. But as I am not a citizen of Seattle, If the Seattle voters want to pay for it, then go for it. But when the State foots the bill, we should all have a say. Build a new elevated structure, with more lanes that it currently has, as well as doing away with the exits in the downtown core.
#12, Because the Narrow Bridge will have a toll to offset the price, and nobody on either side of the bridge got to vote for a new one.
“Yet if the Viaduct is bounded by a surface street to the South and the four-lane Battery St. tunnel to the North, then obviously much of the traffic must be local.”
What are you talking about? What do you mean by “local?”
I understand generally why it is more expensive, but 520 will be a toll AND cost 4+billion. Maybe we should build a suspension bridge over Lake WA……
David @17,
Gee David, do you have to just automatically assume that everybody else is either stupid or a liar? You know exactly what I mean.
Why isn’t the 4-lane Battery tunnel a bottle neck? Because much of the traffic on the Viaduct originates or exits South of it. That’s obvious, and that’s obviously what I’m getting at.
If the issue is maintaining N/S thru traffic, eliminate downtown access, and you’ll eliminate the need to add lanes along the waterfront. I’m suggesting that perhaps a four-lane tunnel with four lanes of surface street above it to accommodate local traffic should speed thru traffic and provide plenty of capacity.
As to the issue of the shoulders, for those who keep bringing it up, it was my understanding that the “tunnel lite” proposal had wider shoulders than would otherwise be needed, so that they could be used as exit lanes during peak traffic. Without exits, you don’t need extra wide shoulders.
Why not go with the ultra-cheap surface option and see what happens? In 12 years if it isn’t working can’t we then go ahead and build something else?
I think we should build plexiglass tubes and build huge fans in them. We could supply every family with a huge “vehicle” shaped like a plastic bank-tube container.
You could hop in the vehicle, enter the tube and WHOOSH — you’re gone! Some say this plan is unworkable, and to them I say: FEH!!
Isn’t 80% of the traffic on the viaduct local? Let’s make it a 2 lane tunnel and seriously improve surface streets.
Thanks for thinking creatively, but I’m with hippy-dippy whackos Sims & Steinbrueck who are thinking most pragmatically with an eye to the post-petroleum future (hippy-dippy whacko fantasy or hard reality?). Surface-plus-transit is looking to be the most realistic compromise between hardcore partisans on the issue; it’s also best for the city. Luckily city leaders gave us the option to vote against the viaduct while the state has nixed the tunnel. That leaves — what? — the best solution all along…
@7 “The “tunnel light” option calls for two lanes each way, with a shoulder on each side which emergency vehicles can use.”
Yes, I realize that, but I was commenting on Goldy’s idea which on first reading appeared to be a downsizing of “tunnel lite” that saved some digging by eliminating shoulders, i.e., an extended Battery Street tunnel. However, Goldy’s clarification @5 indicates he has in mind a revised “tunnel lite” sans downtown exits. In which case, it would be subject to the same criticisms as “tunnel lite.”
Tunnel Lite, of course, is an 11th-hour brainstorm that has not been vetted or thoroughly studied. Its design is based on political and financial exigencies, not transportation needs.
What this whole debate is about, of course, is tension between urban planning and transportation planning. When accomodating both waterfront revitalization and transportation needs proved too expensive, the debate evolved into a competition between these two priorities which, given funding limitations, have become somewhat mutually exclusive and in conflict with each other.
To add some comedy, this debate is taking place against a backdrop of discussion about possibly spending $600 to $700 million of public money — most of the money needed to upgrade the replacement viaduct the state is willing to pay for to the tunnel the city wants — on a basketball arena and NASCAR track … luxury items the region absolutely does not need, and which are guaranteed to add to existing traffic problems. Why has no one but me thought of simply expropriating the money that would go to these projects — which will come from taxes already in place — for the tunnel upgrade?
In the past, the usual outcome of debates of this nature was that all the interest gorups got what they wanted, and the taxpayers got stuck with multiple tax increases to pay for it all. Personally, I think the fact the tunnel-arena-track debates are taking place in an atmosphere of “we’ve got limited resources and the taxpayers’ ability and willingness to pay for all of this matters” is a momentous political and social development. It is a sea change in the way we have conducted public business that, for some strange reason, has not been noticed or commented on, and is not receiving any print. What it boils down to is that special interests can no longer count on a blank check from lawmakers or taxpayers, and the concept of “limits” has entered the realm of public policy and is a factor to be reckoned with. That is a very dramatic shift in how this region governs itself, in my opjnion.
@7 “Personally, I’m still in favor of the full tunnel option. If you are going to build it, build it right.”
Well, yes. This argument is the stake through the heart of “tunnel lite.” And it is absolutely correct; but it leaves unanswered the crux question of where to get the money to do it “right.”
Roger rabbit gets a job:
http://video.yahoo.com/video/p.....38;cache=1
@9 I think the only viable surface option is a no-access throughway with pedestrian and vehicle overpasses or underpasses to connect downtown with the waterfront, and these would add considerably to the cost of the surface option.
If what you are visualizing is an urban arterial with numerous cross streets, crosswalks, and lights, I think that would have near-disastrous traffic flow consequences for Seattle.
@12 Exactly.
@12 What we should do is get rid of the floating bridge and build a giant suspension bridge across Lake Washington, thereby saving 80% of the cost. Or, if you wish to beautify the suspension bridge by equipping it with gold-plated cables and diamond-encrusted towers, you can save 75% of the cost.
@16 “#12, Because the Narrow Bridge will have a toll to offset the price, and nobody on either side of the bridge got to vote for a new one.”
The new 520 bridge will have a toll, too, currently projected by WSDOT at $7 to $10 per trip. And WSDOT doesn’t envision a public vote on it.
@19 OK, you are beginning to make sense now.
@19 My knee jerk reaction is maybe it’s worth a look. The big trouble is that it’s so late in the game to be dreaming up new alternatives. But yeah, this one could grow on me, if the money was there. As I suggested above — grab the arena-track money, and it’s yours.
@22 “Isn’t 80% of the traffic on the viaduct local?”
No. Probably the other way around.
@31
Not gonna happen. Democrats are just as sports-besotted as Republicans.
Besides, The Fairview Fannie reports Senate Transportation Chair Haugen, absent a rebuild, suggests about a billion for surface construction work. House Transportation Chair Clibborn thinks that figure is “a good starting point.” A far cry from the nearly three billion the legislature would give a tear-down/rebuild.
http://www.roadtraffic-technol.....erschelde/
2 bored tunnels are the best alternative. This project in the Netherlands is similar to the situation we face.
A bypass and you could still exit at Western Ave.and at the southern end Edgar Martinez Dr.. This could also aid in easing congestion on the our working docks.
A little late for this, it was not explored in the beginning and now it would be expensive and time consuming to be fully studied, but maybe we are rushing a decision that we will have to live with for years to come.
Goldy, don’t tell me what I know or don’t know. Your sentence was garbled.
Usually, garbled writing means that the writer is confused and ignorant and can’t explain something. I gave you the benefit of the doubt and the chance to clarify.
Right Stuff at 18 asked why we can’t use a suspension bridge over Lake Washington, as we do the Tacoma Narrows Bridge.
It’s actually a reasonable question. The answer is that at the Tacoma Narrows, you had two relatively “hard points” on each side of the bridge to anchor the towers, and a relatively short span in between.
Across Lake Washington, you have a much larger distance, which would require multiple towers built in the middle of the lake to support sections of bridge span. The problem is there is no “hard point” to anchor those intermediate towers in the middle of the lake. The lake itself is very deep, and the bottom is VERY soft, so construction of the towers would have to go a very long way to hit bedrock (I don’t remember the exact depth – I think it was 500 + feet below the water surface). Anyway, much too costly, and then you have the fact that a suspension bridge is costly to maintain. You have to keep all those suspension cables primed and painted regularly to prevent corrosion.
A friend wrote and asked if all the politicos have their heads buried in the sand when it comes to the Viaduct.
Every politician in the State — even Frank Chopp, I have to say with sadness, who is doing heroic work killing the Tunnel — seems to be blind to the obvious.
• The Tunnel died because there was no money.
• The Rebuild will die because there is intense opposition which Gregoire et al will not find worth bucking.
• The “naked” Surface/Transit will not gain enough support because it will be perceived as too vast & risky an “intervention” (as the architects put such things) — which it is.
• Because of political exhaustion, other options (such as the Cable Stay bridge) which might have been truly viable, will never be fairly assessed.
• Repair & Prepare will be “the last man standing.”
Through capacity might well be able to be accommodated on a rehabilitated Alaskan Way, or might require a short tunnel. If needed, that tunnel can be constructed later – perhaps on Western, perhaps beneath where the Viaduct now stands.
The problem is really limited to getting from about King Street, or even just Yesler Way, up to around Union Street (a distance of only .4 to .6 miles) At about Union, where the hill rises up, you can start climbing again without hurting much, (perhaps even in a lidded roadway with the lid connecting to Steinbrueck Park, a la Frank Chopp).
Just to put it in perspective, the Battery Street tunnel is .6 miles long, or so says the SDOT web site.
So this is where Goldy has hit on something. You don’t need onramps and offramps to the tunnel, and the attendant extra lanes within, if the tunnel is only half a mile long – between Pioneer Square and Union Street – and for through traffic only. All the rest can be handled on the surface.
But enough about tunnels. I think it is important to keep Alaskan Way and, as safety allows, the Viaduct, open during construction of all of our other improvements, like the new stadium interchange, myriad surface street rebuilds, the transit improvements, etc.
And as for the seawall, that will have to be a stand-alone project… so to speak, since a tunnel would not be built along with it. Remember that the tunnel and seawall were one in the same in the city’s proposals. However, a seawall that is not also a tunnel wall should be able to be constructed much less expensively. See the example at the Sculpture Park, which cost much less per foot than the technique that is proposed for the central waterfront seawall.
http://www.roadtraffic-technol.....ts/herren/
An interesting project in Lubeck, Germany.
The Federal government offered sufficient funds to the City of Lübeck for a replacement bridge at the initial planning stages in 1997. However, the city authorities decided that the best option for the city was a road tunnel to take the traffic along the diverted national B104 under the river.
Sound familiar, maybe a surface- bored tunnel option is feasible. Back to the drawing board. It is important we get it right the first time.
Let’s resurrrect the Venetian Canal to Alki option.
The canal (along with the plexiglass vacuum tubes) is THE solution!
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It took three days to clean up
the Senior CenterDrinking Liberally.http://citycomfortsblog.typepa.....en_a_.html
It’s not even a backlash
It’s a frontlash.. The Governor is going to back off the Rebuild she is not a fool to risk her job over something for which there are reasonable alternatives.
•••
The great brilliance and appeal of the Surface option is that no one really knows what it is. It’s a blank slate into which everyone who cares about cities can pour their emotion and idealism. At this point it is not a plan or program but simply a goal.
But just as the Tunnel fell because of its own internal contradictions, and as the Rebuild as well will fail because of its own internal contradictions, so too will the “naked” Surface/Transit.
There must be a substantial interim period during which the infrastructure (which might allow the Viaduct to be removed) can be developed. Removing the Viaduct is a reasonable goal; you just can’t it do by waving your hands and repeating “transit.”
if developers covet the newly created property so much, why not sell the development rights to provide the tummel revenue the mayor seeks?
When you offer so many other reasons to ridicule you Clownstein, traffic expertise seems to be the least of them.