In the comment thread on an earlier post, Steven writes:
Somebody around these parts had a pretty good suggestion a while back. If you want to see what the surface option looks like, let’s close the Viaduct for a month and see how traffic responds. Then let’s vote.
The implication being that with the Viaduct closed, I-5 will slow to a permanent crawl while the city’s side streets are choked with drivers seeking alternative routes.
Of course, that’s a completely bullshit analysis, no matter how many times people repeat it. First of all, the surface-plus-transit option is not the do-nothing option — it is the s u r f a c e – p l u s – t r a n s i t option, which means it includes a number of surface and transit improvements to move additional vehicles and people through our existing surface streets. Improvements which would presumably include, um, a new, multilane boulevard in the shadow of the existing Viaduct.
Replacing the Viaduct with $2.4 billion worth of transit and street improvements is not the same thing as simply closing it. Would the surface-plus-transit option, whatever it entails, match the vehicle capacity of the existing elevated structure? Probably not. But it would provide a helluva lot more capacity than doing nothing.
The second problem with Steven’s thought experiment is that one month isn’t nearly enough time for local commuters to change their driving habits, especially knowing that things will return to normal after 30-days. But faced with years of Viaduct closure and disruption, well, that’s when all that seemingly superfluous grey matter tucked behind our foreheads really starts to kick into gear. It may not seem like it while they’re blindly cutting you off in traffic, but the average driver is smarter than your average bear, and will eventually adjust their driving habits to fit the new reality. Just as new freeway capacity attracts more traffic, reducing capacity will discourage some trips and reroute others.
So, how long would it really take to conduct Steven’s thought experiment under objective, real-world conditions? Well, according to WSDOT, if we end up rebuilding a new elevated structure, SR 99 will be shut down in whole or in part for up to 10 to 12 years.
That’s right, drivers will be forced to live without the existing capacity for over a decade.
During this decade of disruption, a Downtown Seattle Association comparison matrix shows that SR 99 would close nights and weekends for 5 to 7 years, and be reduced to two-lanes in each direction for 7 years. Various southbound segments will be closed for periods of time ranging from 6 to 21 months, while the entire structure would be closed in both directions for as long as 9 months.
And that’s if everything goes according to plan.
So when surface critics talk about how Seattle’s economy is going to completely collapse if we lose the Viaduct’s current vehicle capacity, I wonder how they think we’re going to survive the decade or so it will take to rebuild it?
More bullshit, Goldy. Read what it says — “In whole OR IN PART!” DOT has told us repeatedly that there will be two lanes open in each direction at all times except for the 3-4-month period when they are hooking the new roadway up to the Battery St. Tunnel.
Yeah, quote the Downtown Seattle Association. They’re as unbiased as the architects.
I can’t wait to see what kind of shit you’ll pull out of your ass next.
Please tax Puddybud for the cost. He can afford it.
two lanes open in each direction at all times
FOR 10 TO 12 YEARS? SEEMS LIKE A FUNHOUSE MIRROR VERSION OF SURFACE PLUS TRANSIT TO ME.
HERE’S THE DAILY SCHEDULE FOR THE YOS LIB BRO CHARTER SCHOOL:
8:00 AM – 9:00 AM : Bin Laden
9:00 AM – 10:00 AM : Hate Bush, Hate Bush
10:00AM – 10:15 AM : Global Warming Break – Kids please put on your coats before going outside
10:15AM – 11:00 AM : We don’t need no MATH, we just need more taxes
11:00AM – 12:00 NOON: READING: Al Gore’s not so Inconnvienient living style….4 homes, private jet PROPAGANDA. Join a Union Bro
12:00PM – 12:15PM: Free LUNCH
12:15PM – 12:30PM: No ACTIVITY: MARCHING then reversing course
12:30PM – 1:30PM: Ron Reagan
1:30PM – 2:30PM: WRITING: More global er warm er actually let’s call ot global whatever the F weather we’re having let’s just call it climate change. Don’t mention Al Gore’s Private jet and 4 F’n homes…
2:30 eh skip the afternoon man, I got some good stash
The advance students learn how to put rubbers on a cucumber and if you are really advance you take “the many concepts of is”
hehehehehehe
Carbon Credit Winter Blow out Sale:
Buy one carbon credit and get the next one free. While supplies last.
Hurray before summer get here.
Yes the sun has set but I think we need to build the viaduct.
How else will Mr Stupid visit Mrs Clueless:
http://www.nypost.com/seven/03.....derson.htm
The state constitution does not state that Seattle should be the biggest city in the state. We currently have transportation projects in Puget Sound which add lanes to I-5 in Everett and Tacoma and add lanes to I-405 from Kirkland to Renton. In fact all the current and future transportation projects in the Puget Sound combined add up to barely 2.5 billion dollars. At best the viaduct comes in at 2.5 billion, is bigger and taller and adds no traffic lanes. Another monstrousity is proposed at SR 520 with an offramp posed to destroy the arboretum at another 2 to 4 billion. Lets think outside the box. Rename I-405 to I-5 and call I-5 through Seattle the bypass I-405. Dedicate the SR 520 sololy as a light rail right of way. Use those billions to redirect Seattle Port traffic to Tacoma and Everett. Let’s be the State of Washington and get over the Seattlecentric thinking.
I don’t care HOW it happens… Traffic just needs to get better. And fast. Without impacting traffic NOW.
Seriously, we pay the damn construction companies enough. If sure SOMEBODY is smart enough to find a way.
HERE’S THE DAILY SCHEDULE FOR THE DOOFUS CHARTER SCHOOL:
8:00 AM – 9:00 AM : FASCISM
9:00 AM – 10:00 AM : HATE EVERYONE TO THE LEFT OF DINO ROSSI
10:00AM – 10:15 AM : PHYSICAL ACTIVITY: RIGHT WING CIRCLE JERK
10:15AM – 11:00 AM : WINGNUT MATH – STUDY FUNDING ENDLESS WARS WITH ZERO TAXES
11:00AM – 12:00 NOON: READING: RIGHT WING PROPAGANDA
12:00PM – 12:15PM: LUNCH – FEED BRAINS WITH MORE R/W PROPAGANDA
12:15PM – 12:30PM: PHYSICAL ACTIVITY – MARCHING TO JINGOISTIC SONGS AND SLOGANS
12:30PM – 1:30PM: DORI MONSON
1:30PM – 2:30PM: FAUX NEWS
2:30PM – 3:15PM: SUCK UP TO RIGHT WING BILLIONAIRES LIKE SCAIFE.
3:15PM – 1:00AM FAUX NEWS W/CHEETOS, LAYS, PRINGLES AND COKE CLASSIC
THE PERFECT THING DOOFUS WILL BUY WITH HIS VOUCHER!!!
PUDDYBUD – YAWN. ANOTHER LINK TO A MURDOCH PUBLICATION….
OBSERVE YOUR SABBATH.
AN EVENING ADULT EDUCATION CLASS AT THE DOOFUS VOUCHER SCHOOL:
7:00 PM – 9:00PM : LOSING ELECTIONS 101
9:00 PM – 1:00AM : COUCH POTATO FAUX NEWS W/CHEETOS, LAYS, PRINGLES AND COKE CLASSIC.
So what’s the traffic projection for I-5 without the viaduct, and what is it when you throw in 20 more years of population growth? I’m not entirely opposed to taking Seattle back to the 70s, but “plus” proponents should at least acknowledge that they’re proposing to reduce all of Seattle and the entire Canada to Oregon corridor down to two freeway lanes on I-5 in each direction. Calling it a parking lot is euphemistic. And arguing that we’ll have a workable mass transit system in the Puget Sound region in our lifetimes makes Dick Cheney’s Iraq projections look realistic.
Christian Fascism: The Jesus Gestapo of St. Orwell
by Carolyn Baker
http://www.dissidentvoice.org, February 1, 2007
http://www.thirdworldtraveler......scism.html
“How delicious the vindication for the Cristo-fascist psyche! Not only will people who reject their Jesus be grotesquely punished, but their God will prove himself more powerful than the very planet on which they live. Obviously, no need here to worry about global warming — at least the kind created by humans. God will incinerate the earth — his own instantaneous global warming, triumphing over all enemies of both himself and the Christian fascists. As Hedges notes, these fantasies of monstrous cruelty are appealing to many within the Christian-fascist movement because “The loss of manufacturing jobs, lack of affordable health care, negligible opportunities for education and poor job security has left many millions of Americans locked out. This ideology is attractive because it offers them the hope of power and revenge. It sanctifies their rage.” And if any group of people on earth is enraged, it is the Cristo-fascists whose rancor is every bit as caustic and virulent as that of any Islamist fundamentalist on a suicide mission.”
8 “Traffic just needs to get better. And fast.”
Don’t hold your breath.
Not much you can do to help, either…except one thing. Park.
In San Francisco, when the freeway fell down during the earthquake, local politicians decided to replace it with a large blvd featuring waterfront access, condos, shops, office space and AT&T park, home to the Giants.
The area USED to be a shithole as big as Puffybutt’s mouth, but now it’s amazing. It’s the hottest area in San Francisco. More development is going on there than any other part of the city. Thousands of people have moved into the area along with new businesses and it’s outright beautiful to look at. They added MUNI light rail transit to the area and heavy rail a few blocks away to bring tens of thousands of people down to the ball park – and it’s been an amazing success.
San Francisco proved it could be done. A surface option PLUS transit in Seattle would work too.
And not that I’d expect that cowardly asswipe, fuckfaced Steffy to do any real research or reporting, but if he could get over himself and visit San Francisco, he’d see for himself. But my guess is he’s too afraid that the tempation to visit the gay leather bars in the Castro will overwhelm him so he’ll never make the trip.
The Downtown Seattle Association study should be taken to be as neutral as the Iraq Study Group reports were.
15:
San Francisco proved nothing. Citing San Francisco is just another example of the LIES that the “tear-it-down” fanatics, including Goldy and Will, have been foisting on blog readers over this issue, and they don’t get a free pass for LYING.
The Embarcadero in SF was a SPUR. That means it was a dead end, like I-705 in Tacoma, which funnels traffic from I-5 to various other points, and then quits.
Highway 99 is a THROUGH ARTERIAL that funnels traffic THROUGH downtown without stop signs or traffic signals. Remove that capacity and that mobility THROUGH the city and Seattle is dead meat. It will not be able to handle the increased population.
What might have worked in SF will not work here because the geography is entirely different. The only characteristic that the Embarcadero and the AWV shared was that they were elevated highways.
That is what some people can’t stand. That is at the root of the tear-down campaign. It’s ugly, and somehow that trumps every other thing.
They have had six years since the earthquake to come up with an alternative and they haven’t. Because guess what? There isn’t one. But they can’t accept that fact, and their argument becomes religious, and fundamentalist in nature.
REinforce the viaduct, put in mass transit (you know, that impossible thing to build that NY and Chicago have had for over a century, and then build a surface boulevard with overpass pedestrian walkways.
… and folks, don’t forget, it’s FUN and it’s EASY!!!!!!
TRANNY, ANN COULTER, THE REPUBLICAN ATTACK POODLE, TURNS CATTY AND BITCHY SIMULTANEOUSLY.
http://www.editorandpublisher......1003553226
“I was going to have a few comments on the other Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards, but it turns out you have to go into rehab if you use the word ‘faggot,’ so I — so kind of an impasse, can’t really talk about Edwards.” Ann Coulter
Ivan @1,
According to WSDOT SR99 would have less than 50-percent capacity for up to 7 years, while Alaska Way would be reduced to 1 lane in each direction for 10 years.
My point remains. We’re told the city can’t survive without the current Viaduct capacity, and yet it will be asked to do so for at least a decade. So… if we can get by for so long with less than 50-percent vehicle capacity, why couldn’t we get by indefinitely with say 70-percent of the vehicle capacity, plus improved mass transit?
So… if we can get by for so long with less than 50-percent vehicle capacity, why couldn’t we get by indefinitely with say 70-percent of the vehicle capacity, plus improved mass transit?
How is the mass transit improved if it’s just buses sitting in traffic? Because that’s what that “transit” in the surface/transit option is — more buses. And those buses will now be in gridlock downtown once you get rid of the capacity of the viaduct. People take the bus because it saves them time. When you start reducing the time saved getting downtown, which the surface/transit option will do, more people will just give up on the bus and take their car, human psychology being what it is.
Look, the surface/transit option proponents just need to be honest about what they’re proposing: dramatically increasing congestion downtown, dramatically increasing the time it takes to travel on a bus through downtown, and increasing vehicle emissions by having more cars idling and in stop and go traffic. If they’d do that, then at least we could have an honest debate. This idea that somehow congestion will magically go away if you reduce road capacity simply isn’t realistic.
I’m not sure if the people making comparisons to the SF waterfront have actually been there.
The biggest differences between Seattle and SF is as follows:
1) The bridge in SF was ALREADY unusable after the earthquake of ’89;
2) The shipping industry, by and large, had already been relocated to the container terminals thoughout the 60’s and 70’s;
3) The arterial along the SF waterfront was not a crucial industrial trnasportation link between two major hubs of industrial and warehouse activity.
However, none of the above are true of Seattle, and that makes a big difference. Why the Surface/transit proponents still refuse to discuss these things seriously is beyond me.
The one similarity is that in both cities, the major motivation was real estate investors, and the tourist industry. So surface/transit will fit nicely with Nickel’s real estate lobby, and Nickels more or less has already said, “fuck the maritime industry”.
Is that what HA, FoS, and PWC is also saying?
I NEVER SAID MASS TRANSPORTATION MEANS MORE BUSSES. But now that you mention it, some large FREE parking lots outside the city and a cheap bus ride in to Seattle would work.
I never saw such a bunch of weeping Cassandras. And, by the by, solar power technology has just made a huge leap forward.
Haven’t heard much about it on the news, though.
Can’t imagine why….
Casey Sheehan and thousands of others lost their lives protecting an obsolete form of energy.
Way to go neocons!!!
Always on the cutting edge, eh?
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/mon.....view19.xml
Cheap solar power poised to undercut oil and gas by half
By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard
Last Updated: 11:31pm GMT 18/02/2007
“Within five years, solar power will be cheap enough to compete with carbon-generated electricity, even in Britain, Scandinavia or upper Siberia. In a decade, the cost may have fallen so dramatically that solar cells could undercut oil, gas, coal and nuclear power by up to half. Technology is leaping ahead of a stale political debate about fossil fuels.”
Georgetown @22,
I don’t think I’ve ever directly made the SF comparison. Of course they’re different. But I still stand by the assertion that if the Viaduct didn’t exist today, nobody in their right mind would ever propose building it.
I’m one of those people who started out accepting all the capacity assumptions, and siding with the tunnel because I truly believed it would pay off economic and aesthetic dividends over an elevated rebuild, that would make it well worth the extra cost. Over time, as I learned the specifics of the rebuild (taller, wider, thicker) and came to accept the political reality of the tunnel (virtually dead) I was forced to question assumptions, and came to the conclusion that a surface alternative was never given a fair consideration.
I could be convinced that surface-plus-transit won’t work. But it’s going to require a good faith effort to develop a proposal and then debunk it.
Goldy. Reducing AWV capacity to 2 lanes in each direction leaves surface Alaskan Way in place, or half its lanes closed temporarily. From the most recent drawings, it appears WsDOT will close the upper deck and maintain the lower deck. The years of mess on MLK for Link LRT will pale in comparison.
The most important argument in defense of the Surface + transit option is still: we drive too much, too far, for too many purposes, at too high cost and impact. Replacing AWV capacity, once it’s completed, guarantees an immediate need for more capacity ‘perceived’ by those who drive everywhere like chickens with their heads cut off.
Cartoon idea: headless chickens driving cars. Wheee!
“… if the Viaduct didn’t exist today, nobody in their right mind would ever propose building it.”
So? Sure, taking down the Viaduct is a good long-term goal.
With very few exceptions, people who support S/T want to “tear it down now.”
Something that is not mentioned about the run-down Greyhound Terminal in the Denny Triangle. It was not always just a bus depot. It was built in 1927 as the terminal for what we now know as a Light Rail line, but back then they called it the Interurban. This was the terminal for the Pacific Northwest Traction Co’s Seattle-Everett line. This company, owned by Puget Sound Traction, Power, and Light Co,(Today known as Puget Sound Energy) also had a Bellingham-Mt. Vernon line. That one ceased in 1928, about the same time the company’s Puget Sound Electric Railway between Seattle and Tacoma ceased operation. The line to Everett ceased operations in 1939. An interesting thing about the Interurbans, in the cities, they ran on the normal streetcar tracks, no tunnels needed.
Maybe if regulators had denied petitions to abandon, things might have only taken a slower course and they would still have been abandoned. Then again, had the City of Seattle not been so bent on ripping up the Seattle Municipal Street Railway and replace the network, which ran from all corners of the city, with Trackless Trolleys, we might have had a chance to find out. The city even helped make it easy for their competition, with the completion of the George Washington Bridge(which we know as the Aurora Bridge) without provision for city streetcars or the Interurban.
As for those who have mentioned how we are not asked to sacrifice like those on the home front did during WWII. Nobody wants to. Metro just topped 103 Million riders last year. Well, it is a record for them, but not the region. Seattle Transit set that in 1944. 130 million riders, and this was for just a city system. Gasoline was not just expensive for the time, it was also being rationed for the war effort. People either carpooled, or took the bus.
Now perhaps the Repair and Prepare idea sounds best. I at first was against a retrofit, but perhaps it should be considered.
“Would the surface-plus-transit option, whatever it entails, match the vehicle capacity of the existing elevated structure? Probably not. But it would provide a helluva lot more capacity than doing nothing.”
This is exactly why surface + transit is a non-starter. We need more, not less, through traffic capacity in downtown Seattle. That would be true even if the region’s population did not grow at all over the next 30 years, instead of the rapid population growth that is expected. Gregoire is right about this — SR-99 is a state highway, so it’s the state’s decision, and the governor and WSDOT would be irresponsible to REDUCE through traffic capacity in this corridor.
The surface+transit option proponents need to do a better job of pushing a concrete vision for the future of Hwy. 99 through downtown. In today’s Times, Danny Westneat draws an apt parallel with Chicago’s Laksehore Drive, which abuts Grant Park without rendering the park useless, let alone blighted. 99 should be similarly conceived. Why is it fine for 99 to mix with cross-traffic everywere but downtown Seattle? Isn’t this just a little absurd? I mean, 99 ceases to be an expressway directly north and south of downtown–why on earth should it suddenly turn expressway right at the point of greatest density?
Alaskan Way could be widened to six lanes, with four or five lights between the stadiums and Battery Street, and a dedicated lane for Light Rail. This will marginally slow through traffic, but since the overwhelming concern seems to be commuting options into Seattle, and not through it, this objection if pretty irrelavant.
Traffic on 99 is still relatively light, with nothing like the backups on I-5, so even with increased time for a few stoplights, it seems highly unlikely that the kind of gridlock some of you are worried about will ever materialize.
If I hadn’t lived in Seattle for 20+ years, I would be stunned that this option wasn’t being given real consideration, since it is manifestly the cheapest, and probably the best, even disregarding cost.