The state violated environmental-impact regulations by seeking bids from potential contractors for a $4.2 billion tunnel under downtown without studying tunnel alternatives, says a lawsuit filed this afternoon in King County Superior Court. Elizabeth Campbell, 57, who ran a low-key campaign for mayor but lost in the primary, says she filed the suit against transportation department head Paula Hammond as a last-ditch effort to stop a deep-bore tunnel that costs too much money and diminishes traffic capacity.

“Going the legal route—that’s the only way to put a halt to it right now.” Otherwise, Campbell says, “It can’t be undone.”

The State Environmental Policy Act requires the state to study a project’s effects and issue an Environmental Impact Statement “before government decisions are made that commit … to a particular course of action,” the lawsuit says. The state won’t complete the impact statement until 2011, according to the suit. But on September 15, the state issued a 31-page request for qualifications from companies that want to design and build the tunnel. Seeking proposals from tunnel builders but not seeking proposals for alternatives, such as a rebuilt elevated freeway or a surface-transit option, the suit says, “predisposes decision-makers to choose the tunnel option.”

The suit says that the Washington State Department of Transportation is “making a mockery” of the process required to rebuild the downtown leg of Highway 99, which is now completed by the Alaskan Way Viaduct.

Campbell, a Magnolia resident, filed the suit along with her nonprofit, Seattle Citizens Against the Tunnel—known as SCAT. Campbell calls herself the “titular head of SCAT.”

Although Campbell wants to rebuild the viaduct, a scenario the Stranger finds appalling, the lawsuit seems reasonably grounded. Seeking bids from contractors without following state procedure for gauging the tunnel’s costs, traffic impacts, and environmental impacts seems both hasty and gives the tunnel an unreasonable advantage over alternatives, like a surface-transit option. However, the viaduct is crumbling—it threatens to collapse on drivers if anyone sneezes—and the state has an urgent interest making sure people aren’t caught in a human juicer.

“The state seems to be trying to ram through a project without doing an Environmental Impact Statement and explaining the costs, risks and negative community and environmental impacts to the public,” says Cary Moon, director of the People’s Waterfront Coalition, which is not involved in the lawsuit.

“If the state isn’t going to voluntarily share information about the costs, risks and negative impacts of a mega-project before they commit the public’s money, then someone needs to remind them of the rules,” Moon adds. “The Seattle public deserves to know what the state plans to do before the contracts are issued and it’s too late.”

The suit concludes by asking a judge to block the state Department of Transportation from taking any action that would “pre-judge” the decision on how to replace the existing Alaskan Way Viaduct. Campbell, who has hired the law firm Bricklin & Newman, says, “It has a chance of winning.”

27 replies on “Activists Sue State to Block Tunnel”

  1. wow. everyone’s “done deal” is going to crumble like a….like a….oh i wish there was a big piece of old, deteriorating infrastructure that i could use to complete my simile!…

    that thing is viafuct.

  2. I can’t believe that I am going to say this about a woman who in her Mayoral Campaign declared “there’s a war on cars,” but nice work Elizabeth!

  4. I love it when you pro-tunnel bigots have to eat crow.

    Seriously, you said it couldn’t be stopped.

    The battle hasn’t even started.

  6. “However, the viaduct is crumbling—it threatens to collapse on drivers if anyone sneezes—and the state has an urgent interest making sure people aren’t caught in a human juicer.”

    Oh My God!! The viaduct is crumbling. We need to replace it immediately with whatever the state dictates, no matter the costs or other impacts.

    Huh… What’s that… It’s been like that for 8 years? The deep bore tunnel wasn’t even considered until about a year ago? All the other plans that had preliminary studies were dismissed? Even the ones previously preferred by the WSDOT?

    OK now I’m just confused.

  8. Elizabeth Campbell, now grasping for attention, latches onto whatever is on the front page of the daily metro newspaper.
    Will McGinn do pro bono work here, or will Elizabeth Campbell… Or is she getting paid to do this by, oh, I do not know, 3 degrees of separation from McGinn.

    If there is linkage, she has a bigger problem than that run for mayor.

    Quite frankly, it will not be too hard to hard to find a coule loose facts that are similar enough to imply linkage (not like I write for the Stranger or Publicola, but it is similar bs).

  10. I’m not a huge fan of the tunnel, but…
    1. You don’t have to shut down the viaduct for 5 years while building it.
    2. It also gives you the additional surface street option when it’s all done.

    The reasons I’m not a big fan?
    1. It’s expensive.
    2. You lose the view while stuck in traffic.

  12. How can people who seem so smart, be so dumb when it comes to reality?

    This state is no more sophisticated than Hazzard County. Boss Hogg owns everything…if he wants a trolley, he gits a trolley. If Boss Hogg wants a tunnel…he gits a tunnel…same as he gets a Light Rail and gets them to flood Kent Valley because he wants his real estate holdings to go up.

    Everyone here with their big brains and middle class salaries are pathetic powerless buffoons.

  14. The tunnel isn’t that expensive if we save up for it.

    That $4.1 billion price tag comes to some $6800 per resident, so start saving!

  16. @6:

    “However, the viaduct is crumbling—it threatens to collapse on drivers if anyone sneezes—and the state has an urgent interest making sure people aren’t caught in a human juicer.”

    The viaduct can be torn down within 2-3 years, the surface and transit improvements put into place, and then then a tunnel can be studied and bored later if the surface/transit advocates are wrong and the city shuts down. That, in fact, is what the Governor’s stakeholder group recommended. It was only because of big business pressure that the governor insisted a tunnel be built first.

  19. @18 FTW

    WiS it will be really sweet to watch all these lawsuits get thrown out of court, and the tunnel finally going forward.

    Enough already.

    Fucking obstructionists.

  20. So long as they wait until after the vote has been certified, it makes the issuance of a contract highly problematic.

    In war, you don’t fight just one battle. You push your enemy into a no-win situation and make him think he has an escape route – but use that as the kill zone.

    Seattle doesn’t want the Billionaires’ Tunnel. And you know it.

  22. Hence the “in Seattle” part.

    (waits while the tumblers click in in Ralph’s brain)

    Actually, we have a lot of people who were in the military here – you just don’t know it.

  25. You know what?

    I love traffic…….Nothing is better than being stuck in traffic with a blasting headache and fresh coffee spilled on the inside of my car do to a suddne stop in traffic.

    Oh yea I love to pay taxes. Lets see another sales tax. Oh maybe an income tax. Oh this is great.

    Darn, hey thanks a lot Sue!!!!

    I was looking forward to getting stuck in traffic. Oh this tunnel was going to be fantastic. I have fantasies of hours in traffic.

    Another dime or two on the gas tax and hey maybe a sales tax of around 10%. That would have been great.

    Oh well maybe the our great govener and visionary mayor can still persevere.

    I sure would hate to have my vote count.

  27. Jeeze, just rebuild the viaduct already. It’s is the only option that make sense for economical and traffic capacity reasons.

    Unless you have an alternative to rebuilding that costs less while not reducing traffic capacity, then STFU.

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