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800 Maynard Ave S, Suite 200, Seattle, WA 98134
800 Maynard Ave S, Suite 200, Seattle, WA 98134
How about we stop wasting time, let the city leaders make the decision and just get it done.
No more debating, public process, protests, whatever...
This fucking debate will not end before the viaduct comes down in the next quake, taking hundreds of West Seattle commuters with it.
This is the citywide version of getting mad taking your transformers and going home.
Smart thinking. Maybe they can fund themselves a job like Eyeman for the next 180 days during this time of unemployment and recession.
Me first me first! I have an idea! Let me be the leader so I can draw a salary!
Enough already. Build a damn tunnel and let's be done with it!
no. we voted against a tunnel and replacing the viaduct with a new viaduct.
surface/transit was the third option that was never put up to a vote.
How about file an initiative to recall the Governor? Pretty sure you could fill up both signature cards just as fast.
you are #1 on my shitlist.
contact info there - let her know how you feel.
The last time they did a project this big downtown, the Bus Tunnel, they pretty much destroyed downtown business for over a decade. Dozens of businesses closed, including Frederick & Nelson. Is that the kind of property owner thrill you mean?
The insatiable crane
Regarding "Redmond law bans feeding of pigeons" [Local News, July 20]: Feeding pigeons and cleaning up after the loose goose(s) is really testament to two problems endemic to modern society: an urban life bereft of any meaningful ability for humans to commune with nature; and the plight of wild animals whose fate has been ill-considered as society encroaches on their habitat.
Rather than holding our noses and acting like the problem is soiling geese and the wild-animal feeders — which includes not just those who feed pigeons, but those who feed squirrels, raccoons and other small critters — how about realizing they are just symptoms of the real problem: urban development gone wild — the urban development that failed to account for and include elements of our natural lineage in its various forms, and the urban development that failed to plan for all the wild species that were being displaced by it.
— Elizabeth Campbell, Seattle
It will be a boom because the waterfront will be opened up and thus property values will increase. Imagine all the properties that will suddenly have an unobstructed view of Elliot Bay?
King County used to be valuable when there was only Seattle -- but now the exurbs of Bellevue, Kent, Renton...are well capable of managing their own affairs.
I would also break up "Seattle" into 3 political entities, South, Central and North, so that people have a greater voice in their own government.
Big overburdening government should not be the norm for W. Wash.
@17, Elizabeth Campbell is a moron. You can't have it both ways. You can't have a natural environment in the city, and attempting to do so just contributes to the destruction of natural environments elsewhere. Cities SHOULD be concentrations of unnatural, even anti-natural, environments. Density here saves wild spaces there. Open space in the city = shit.
Your insistence that the waterfront is going to be windy, loud and deserted sounds like when they said putting a park on a reservoir lid would produce nothing but a no man's land homeless camp.
Fnarf the homeless will be there during tourist season only, not during tourust season.
The 4 story buildings in the purdy pictures will be 16-20 within tens years of the viaduct coming down and no one posting here will be enjoying the view.
One of the S/T people will have a much improved view and she will be able to enjoy a great Moon view.
Will the anti-car S/T people join in fighting this car mega project or will the PWC fade away and enjoy their new views?
UPZONE WEST SEATTLE!
Since the surface option doesn't seem to be attracting any love from officials, I'll take the tunnel over replacing the behemoth. Bottom line: I want my waterfront back. I do not want to limit the best views in the city to drivers. I don't want the psychological isolation of having downtown sandwiched between two highways. The best cities in the world are those that utilize their waterfronts effectively. Those are the cities that feel the most alive, the most vibrant. (Istanbul, Paris, London...) New York is starting to utilize its waterfront for post-industrial life. It's about damn time Seattle started acting like the world class city it continually claims to be. Saying yes to a new viaduct would be like cheering a return to caves.
That said, the State will force us to pay for it, just as they did with the stadiums we voted down.
Idiotic remark - before the viaduct it was railroad ave - before that it was stinky mudflats - it was never some welcoming space. And how is it YOUR waterfront? And it will be so much better when the only people that have the viaduct view will live in multi-million dollar condos
And as for you being officially against initiatives, who gives a shit.
It just makes sense! Move on.
I would support a tunnel, tolls and all, if it had three lanes in each direction and on- and off-ramps that would serve Ballard.
Barring that, I support this initiative. They're not tearing down the Viaduct till the tunnel is done anyway, Governor or no Governor, so this will give it another couple years of life.
Pro-life measures have been attempted twice in the last two legislative sessions in South Dakota. The first attempt was in 2006 when the state legislature passed HB 1215, a bill that banned all abortion except those undertaken to protect a woman's health. Pro-choice organizers then collected signatures under the state's veto referendum laws, putting the new bill before the voters in the Abortion Ban Referendum. About 44% of South Dakota's voters agreed with the legislature's bill, so it was rejected and never took effect. The legislature's repudiated bill would have assigned criminal penalties to those that performed abortions outside of the new parameters.
I see your point -- I'm just saying initiatives produce a lot of bad too.
Citizens overwhelmingly rejected NEW VIADUCT and TUNNEL.
Surface wasn't even on that vote.
70% of voters rejected the tunnel.
Gregoire calls the tunnel something that "majority of people want."
Gregoire: idiot or liar? You make the call.
-most expensive,
-most dangerous (in landfilled soil, right next to Puget Sound body of water),
-least likely to carry traffic (two lanes and no shoulders only?? You mean just like the Battery St. tunnel bottleneck right now but it will be two miles long?? Excellent!!)....
the puny tunnel wins.
Traffic will be backed up for miles. The two lane and no shoulder tunnel would be inadequate even today to carry traffic.
Just imagine the fun you will have anytime even one car breaks down deep in the middle of the tunnel. While you are attempting to get to the airport.
You will be sitting in a straw-size tunnel, breathing exhaust fumes and thanking Gregoire for calling a 70% opposition by voters "a majority in favor" of the tunnel.
After an hour of that, you will be wishing the Big Earthquake hits so the seawater rushing in to drown you will take you out of your misery.
Have fun drowning or suffocating to death down there!
The process was heinous and expensive, but overall the results were great.
This is a great in-depth article about the snafus and final benefits.
In 2006 the people overturned the electeds ban - in 2008 the people rejected the ban in another vote.
All initiatives are not good but they do give the people a chance to overturn the special interest legislation that political contributions sometime result in - special interests can also exploit the initiative process - ceteris paribus I want the initiative process.
And we could use some londonbusses, too. Those double decker ones would work gereat here, too.
If you look the election people had a choice:
1. Yes Viaduct
2. Yes Tunnel
3. No on both (which by default is surface option)
More people voted for option #1 than the other two so yes, a plurality of people preferred a viaduct than the other 2 options.
If you look the election people had a choice:
1. Yes Viaduct
2. Yes Tunnel
3. No on both (which by default is surface option)
More people voted for option #1 than the other two so yes, a plurality of people preferred a viaduct than the other 2 options.
a SurveyUsa poll after showed that a strong majority wished to keep the capacity.
Who do I contact to sign?
Where will this traffic go? The commercial traffic out of Ballard will be adding to the Mercer Mess as it tries to navigate around downtown Seattle. And that, in turn, will further foster gridlock on I-5. Or, the trucks will continue to run down 15th / Elliott Avenue and then down Alaskan Way and the waterfront. Won't that make for a pleasant experience for everyone.
The ONLY reason for the tunnel is to appease the developers who will leap on that property like stink on (oops!). Next, there'll be buildings instead of open space and the city will increase its tax base to try and ward off budget shortfalls. If you think this won't happen, you're sadly mistaken - in fact, the Emerald City you live in is more like the one in the Wizard of Oz than Washington.
City / State government is pathetic when it comes to making ANY decision. They either study it to death and do nothing or completely ignore the vote of the people.
Anyone not interested in initiatives does not understand the damage an elected official can do in the short time that "they" might be in office. Initiatives and referendums are a critical protection from wholesale disregard of the true governing faction, the majority of the will of the people.
The question that has never been asked is...why not retro-fit this current vintage structure...all while keeping at least 2 lanes open while doing so...and re-naming it something like +the peoples elevated transporter" or some such. Without a corporate name, which I hate..let a state wide contest re-name it whatever...but I will tell you this, the via-duct is yours, and if that "view" road were allowed to be gone, you would never have that view for yourself ever again. Remember, you are the Government, and that is your road.
B.Longwill