i just don't believe the difference betwen a tunnel and the surface solution is only 300 million.

my fear is that the 3.1 billion tunnel leaves heaps of viaduct rubble all the way down the waterfront.

Cant take the money for the tunnel and re-allocate it for anything else other than a state road project.

4 lane hybrid tunnel was already voted on in 2007, rejected by 69%. Deep bore tunnel option was never voted on.

Surface street plus option, isnt an option because theres nothing on paper that says it can work. Should voters approve to stop the tunnels construction, supporters would have to scramle and get projected costs and designs read and place that up for a 3 way vote a year later. Even if thats all ready to go, were talking years after that election for Olympia (who wasted 50-100 million dollars lost by rejecting the tunnel) to approve that plan and the funding.

As Joel Connelly said this morning "It took less time to form a plan to send a man to the moon than it has to replace the viaduct".

http://www.seattlepi.com/local/connelly/…

There is no single plan that doesnt have problems. All plans cost money, all plans risk going over budget, all plans carry risks.

because the council has ballyhooed the tunnel and subverted talk of the surface/transit, the tunnel has the advantage of familiarity

FYI - the mayor has been endlessly campaigning for surface/transit at every opportunity since he started running for election. So has The Stranger.

So, um, what's your point again?

I got that call last night and, for the first time ever in a phone poll, I had to say Not Sure on all of them. I want the viaduct rebuilt (don't hate me), and I just am not sure which of the other two options is less undesirable at this point.

I'm with Connelly on this one. Please, for the love of God JUST DO SOMETHING.

@3) I actually changed that line right after I posted, but I stand by it. The mayor has campaigned against the tunnel, but he's been sorely lacking in leading on surface/transit.

And here's a fun idea for an article: Calculate how much money we've spent talking about this issue (including the costs of repeatedly putting it on a ballot) since 2001.

Best: Viaduct
Better: Tunnel
Basic (aka shitty): Surface/Transit

But, that's just, like, my opinion man.

I'm bored OF the tunnel discussion, so I guess I'd pick that one.

What is absurd is how tunnel proponents were the ones who derailed the ongoing public process to suit their own unpopular needs - and have since projected that onto everyone else in Seattle.

This issue was already decided. In March 2007 Seattle voters rejected both a rebuild (sorry guys) and a tunnel. Work then went forward on a surface/transit option. Seattle moved on.

But at the end of 2008, after the right-wing Cascadia Center kept beating the drum about a tunnel, there was a sudden about-face. With no public hearings or discussion, Gregoire, Nickels, Sims and business leaders decided to do a deep bore tunnel, which hadn't been part of the discussions for some time. It wasn't something that the public demanded, it wasn't something that emerged from a bunch of meetings. It was something imposed by people who did not care about the public process.

Once the DBT was backed, a quick deal was cut with the state to put Seattle on the hook for the cost overruns. Council was pushed to speedily approve it, getting ahead of a mayoral election that looked like it would (and did) produce a winner who did not support the DBT.

Work could already be happening right now on surface/transit/I-5 and the unsafe viaduct could be coming down in months and not years. But that's not happening, because a public process was ignored.

Worst of all, those same people who broke the public process are now getting to claim it's everybody else that is causing delays and breaking the process. It's completely absurd.

Do we have an option to entertain the tunnel a little bit, so it's not so bored?

@10 "This issue was already decided. In March 2007 Seattle voters rejected both a rebuild (sorry guys) and a tunnel."

They didnt reject the deep bore tunnel. They rejected the hybrid 4 lane tunnel + surface street option as well as a re-built viaduct options (which ironically enough, runs in first place based on local polling).

http://your.kingcounty.gov/elections/200…

The state is shoving the tunnel down our throat because the city REFUSED to pick a plan. The state waited and waited and decided that since we couldnt make a decision, that the state will end up making it for us and they chose the tunnel. The option of choosing which option to replace the viaduct with, didnt appear to be something that anyone would get to vote on. We just voted to narrow down the options because there was maybe 8 different options on the table.

The poll (if accurately represented) seems to omit the fact that the tunnel will be tolled, a distinction which could erode support for the tunnel as voters become more informed. The reality of $4 tolls has not set in. Surface/transit might actually have a fighting chance against the DBT in a head to head vote.

Death to the Tunnel!

"How would it fair in a two way race? And how would it fair after a campaign season...?"

Dom - I think you mean "fare," not "fair."

@4: it's hard not to hate you for wanting a rebuild. a rebuild would be an international badge of shame for regressive planning. a repair/rebuild is the worst possible outcome - and it is quickly becoming the most likely.

I want to see a poll on YES/NO to removing the viaduct, say by the end of 2012, regardless of what the replacement is.

@15) Thank you and fixed.

New viaduct.

But I'll support any option if Cliff Mass gets his radio job back.

@13 "Tolls"

Wow, so you assume that a surface street option wont be tolled? Tolls are part of a package that is used to lure Republicans (in Olympia) into voting for it. As long as it has a sunset clause, tolls are fine, it helped pay for the 520 bridge and eventually removed.

Dont assume that the surface street option will win simply because it doesnt have a toll because it will probably have one. You just dont know it because theres almost no plans on paper that state the surface option can work. No impact studies, no engineering designs, no cost estimates, really it only exist as an idea written down on paper.

There are tolls on the Deep Bore Tunnel because were so far into the project. You dont see tolls for the surface street option because almost no work has been done on it.

@13 - As soon as voters hear about the tolls, the tunnel will lose the referendum. Probably still be forced through. Then we'll have a tunnel nobody drives in due to tolls. Until every other road in Seattle is tolled, the tunnel will be empty.

@21: So how exactly would they toll a surface street? Would a vehicle that enters from a side street and only travels on Alaskan for a block or two be tolled? What about ferry traffic? Even with the electronic tolling technology currently being used, it's just not practical. Maybe it could work as part of an overall congestion pricing scheme that encompasses all of downtown, but otherwise it's not gonna happen.

Also, I think your apostrophe key might be broken- you should have that checked.

"all plans risk going over budget"

All tunnel plans risk going over budget MORE. After a century of surface transit, those costs are very predictable. The cost of restoring a tipped-over skyscraper is more variable.

as an absurdist, at this point in the process i feel that almost any option will satisfy me. but the tunnel that no one uses (due to tolls & a lack of entrances/exits downtown) is beginning to over-ride my desire for the best public policy option... surface/transit.

@23 "So how exactly would they toll a surface street"

Same way they plan to toll 520 and the same way they currently toll the Tacoma narrows bridge. They'll do it automatically, wirelessly through a RFID sticker. Scans your sticker to see if you have paid. Didnt pay? Then it takes a photo of your license plate and bills you at the end of the month. Mind you, these are tolls with a sunset clause, once things are paid for, the tolls go away.

@26: Apples and oranges. Both of your examples (520 and Narrows) have clear, controlled entry and exit points, while surface streets do not. Thank you also for explaining electronic tolling as if I didn't cover that in my previous post- yes, I understand how it works, and no, I don't concede it will work on downtown surface streets.

The notion that surface streets will be tolled if we don't build the DBT is pure fantasy, but it sure is a good scare tactic for the pro-tunnel crowd.

@21: "it will probably have one. You just dont know it "

It's nice to pull things straight from your ass, isn't it Kinison?

@27, "It wont work downtown".

Well its going to have to work, because legislators *might* make tolling a requirement for any viaduct replacement, especially if Seattle voters reject the tunnel and piss away 50-100 million, which is basically money already spent + lawsuits from construction companies who are now hiring. So yeah, it might happen. Do you think the state will take any blueprint or ideas from our Mayor and run with it 100%? "It says here no tolling, ohhh he got us!! foiled again! No tolling I guess, im a lawyer right?".

A surface street waterfront highway, assuming we even have room for 4 lanes (yet alone 6) side by side, plus the existing 2-3 lanes, and sidewalks, and on/off ramps, and several skywalks going over it. Oh yeah, its going to get a car toll. I suppose if it traveled at 35mph, it would be pointless to pay for a toll, but then again it wouldnt be classified as a highway anymore.

Sure you can always opt to toll I-5 and not toll I-99, but that would piss off so many people, that it would force a statewide vote, to of which the surface+ option loses by a landslide. People wont accept paying a toll on I-5 for just passing through Seattle.

When people bitch about how traffic is going to suck (sucks already) at the mere idea of tolling a tunnel, how its going to cause massive gridlock (worse than it already is now), then the state's really not going to give a fuck about that. Why!? Because the tunnel gets paid off in 30-40 years, then gets removed. Its only a small annoyance in the life of a steel re-enforced concrete tunnel that will last over 100 years. Dont think so? Northern Tunnel was built in 1905, it goes under Seattle, still works. Majority of the subways in NY stink and are rat infested, but they still work.

You can toll surface streets, bridges, highways, whatever you want. It's not rocket science.

Of course, when you do, you have to face the reality that tolls reduce traffic (duh!). And, that if you want to reduce traffic, you don't need a fancy new tunnel under downtown. All you have to do is put a toll on the existing routes...and suddenly those 100k vehicles you've been fussing about are an easily managed 50k. Or 30k. Or even fewer, depending on the toll.

Indeed, the toll is really the only good thing about the DBT. Therefore, I modestly propose fuhgetting about the DBT and spending a mere sliver of the billions on a study of how to use tolls to maintain roads and improve mobility for Seattle residents.

You're welcome.