"and there's never been a project of this scope that didn't involve huge cost overruns"

This is laughably false. It's not even on the same planet as the truth. I'm not a tunnel proponent but I'm not going to lie to get my way.

@2 Why can't Tom states his reasons for the tunnel? PUBLIC DEBATE! Why can we not have a public debate? WHAT IS THE COUNCIL SCARED OF? Only good could come of it. This is ridiculous!

@Fnarf, and with the tunnel proponents making absurd claims on their part, i.e. that there simply won't be overruns, period, it's dumb to base opposition on overreaching claims. It's enough to simply point to the patent falsehood of the proponents own premise. If they were putting forth responsible arguemnts about how they will mitigate the quite obvious risk of cost overruns, then they'd have a position to defend. But they aren't doing that. The are simply denying that cost overruns can happen.
It's not the scale of the project per se, it's the uncertainty that comes from boring 1) on a hillside 2) near water 3) through land that has been carelessly filled in lots of different ways 4) under large buildings set on pilings 5) managed by a beauracracy that prefers the ostrich approach to cost containment to an adult human responsible one.

I'll stick an "almost" in there, Fnarf, if it'll make you feel better.

Perhaps it has something to do with the fact the presence of the viaduct, and the downtown bypass that it creates, has become embedded into the city's circulatory system over the last half-century. And sensibly, Rasmussen is representing the part of the city that doesn't want a major artery ripped from Seattle without some sort of solution.

If Rasmussen is committing political suicide, like Nickels apparently did by putting the obviously ailing and flawed monorail out of its misery, then bully for him. I will honor him for defending a sensible solution for the transportation that the viaduct currently provides, and re-opening our waterfront to Elliott Bay.

And if you're looking for someone to blame for the cost overruns, if there are any, and if they can be assessed against the city contrary to all legal precedent, then blame the man who peevishly insisted the language be put into the bill for the tunnel: 43rd District Representative and Speaker of the House of Representatives, FRANK CHOPP.

Dan, there have been MANY THOUSANDS of public works projects like this that have been under budget. There are hundreds of these tunnel-boring machines in the ground right now, in all kinds of soils, including conditions that are just as complex as this one. Yes, it's a big diameter, but it's also really short. As these projects go, it's not that big a deal.

I agree that the provisions for cost overruns are inadequate, and there are other reasons to be unhappy with the project, but this fear-mongering is ridiculous. Ironically, it's exactly reminiscent of the campaign to destroy the monorail.

And if anyone mentions the Big Dig in Boston again I'm going postal, I swear it.

Tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel, tunnel...

The same that's happened to all of them. They think they're royalty. They've joined big money to screw everybody else.

P.S. Have you ever gone to any of them for help? Don't bother! They can't be bothered by the rabble!

@7 -
If, as you state, there are "MANY THOUSANDS of public works projects like this one [the multi-billion dollar tunnel proposed ro replace the viaduct] that have been under budget," please name a few of them.

Hey, Doorknob Danny, your concern about overruns is hysterical.

Speaking of hysteria, do you remember the Monday after the Thanksgiving weekend when Dom and Eli weren't around? Do you remember directly linking to The Seattle Times' Pultizer-Prize-winning coverage?

Seattle's only newspaper. Ya sure, ya betcha.

I don't see any reason to doubt the 40% probability of overrun that the consultant came up with. It's far from "all" or "almost all", but it's a high enough chance to plan for.

Dear Fnarf--
Back to Logic 101 for you. (By the way, I took logic at Seattle University from a very old Jesuit, so I know of what I speak.) You are committing the logical fallacy of composition. See here, for an explanation: http://www.logicalfallacies.info/relevan…

So, sure, Fnarf, "there have been MANY THOUSANDS of public works projects like this that have been under budget." But, what does "like this" mean? Oh, it the category of public works projects that come in under budget! I get it. But, Fnarf, just because you say that the BIG SEATTLE BORE is in that category doesn't make it so. How about the Brightwater Waste Treatment Plant project as a lovely example? I mean, come on, be logical here.

Does anyone know of another state highway project that requires local residents to pay for cost over-runs?

@11, the extension of the IND 7 train in New York. The fourth bore under the Elbe. The Western Scheldt tunnel in the Netherlands. Citytunnel in Malmo, Sweden. The light rail tunnelling under the Allegheny River in Pittsburgh. The Fort McHenry tunnel under Baltimore. The St. Clair River tunnel. The North Downs Tunnel. The Metro Gold Line tunnel under East LA. The Sound Transit tunnel under Beacon Hill was under budget, for crying out loud.

Seriously, you folks sound like ninnies. "A TUNNEL? Under the ground? You can't go down there! What if there's monsters? Aliens? Spiders! Swamp gas!"

@14, you may have taken Logic 101, but you're still dumber than a stack of bricks. I didn't say that this tunnel was going to come in under budget. I was responding to Dan's statement that "there's never been a project of this scope that didn't involve huge cost overruns". Which is not true.

@17, OK, great, scratch Beacon Hill off the list. There are still hundreds of others.

Rasmussen took the money from the Billionaires and Millionaires and sold us out.

By the way, if you've never rescued people - and ex-people - from a tunnel collapse, you shouldn't call it safe.

This is brutal.

I love it. The council is trying to actually DO SOMETHING for once, and the same people who constantly gripe about "Seattle process" (i.e., pretty much everyone at The Stranger) are getting their panties in a bunch over it.

@22 - great - can you pay the extra $10,000 in taxes that my household will incur for your tunnel, then?

@20, I should just ignore you, shithead, but I just can't. You're wrong, but if I ever was in an emergency, in a tunnel or elsewhere, the very last thing I'd want to see is your babbling bobblehead standing there.

How many people have died in the Holland Tunnel, Will?

There's a difference between the hysteria of the Stranger's overhyping the budgetary risks of tunneling, which is a discussion with two sides, and your complete inanities, which make Dan sound like Isambard Kingdom Brunel in comparison.

The gold line is going to East LA now? Orale!

Btw Tom is a politician. A traditional one.

Goddamn it, SeMe, where YOUR blog? I want to read it, and find out who you are so I can buy you a beer someday.

Dig baby dig?

@24 no idea, I didn't have to pull people out of that one.

Got $10,000? Cause you're going to be paying that for the inevitable cost overruns on Seattle taxpayers' dime.

That's in addition to the $5 each way tolls - all so some property developers can get rich blocking the views that people on Capitol Hill think they're going to get.

I remember reading Tom Rasmussen make a decent argument a few months ago in the Times about why the state can't stick Seattle with the bill for cost overruns. I'd love to see Tom step up now and do what Richard Conlin doesn't have guts to do--engage in a real back-and-forth about cost overruns and respond to FUD like what Dan Savage says in this posts, which exists somewhere in the continuum between stretching the truth and outright falsehood:

There's no daylight between Rasmussen and Conlin: Tom, like Richard, wants the city to hurry up and sign a contract that leaves Seattle taxpayers on the hook for any and all cost overruns.

If guaranteeing that Seattle voters are shielded from even the indirect impacts of tunnel overruns is our true concern, then there are concrete steps the city can take now. See Nick Licata's proposal. But we don't have to do as Mike O'Brien or Mike McGinn suggest and throw this back in the face of the state legislature.

I'm no tunnel cheerleader (and I have little respect for most of the tunnel cheerleaders out there), but our two Mikes are becoming transparent in in their attempt to kill the tunnel project under the guise of protecting Seattle taxpayers.

Sadly, The Stranger is letting them off the hook at the same time it's trying to hold Richard Conlin et al accountable.

@28, You're a hero, Will! No, wait -- you're a lying dipshit. My mistake. Pulling another turd out of your ass does not constitute "rescuing people from a tunnel fire". Though even a turd would be well relieved to get away from you.

@30 it was my job. So was fighting fires, rescuing people from floods, and a lot of other things - Canadians don't tend to talk about what they've done like Americans do and at the time we all did what we had to.

The Tunnel is still a disastrous mistake.

The Stranger is just recycling all the hysterical articles from 15 years ago about the City buying a parking garage for $71 million. Oh! We could have spent it all on homeless shelters!! Well, guess what. The City has made a fortune off that garage, and the redevelopment it sparked essentially prevented downtown Seattle from becoming downtown Detroit.

Why does Rasmussen want a tunnel? Because keeping Seattle a place where manufacturers can actually move goods in and out of the industrial areas of the city provides the tax base that supports funding human services.

You might pause to recall that Seattle finances its human services from property taxes and sales taxes, not income taxes. Industrial property that is underserved by adequate transportation is worth far less.

Cheryl Chow used to vote the same way when she was on the City Council, and no one ever accused her of neglecting those in need of human services.

And Will @20 (or "shithead," Fnarf's more apt term), the last thing Rasmussen needs is to "sell out" to millionaires or billionaires. His partner is worth a fortune. Don't be a dick.

There also seems to exist among Sloggers extreme distaste for "opening up the waterfront." If waterfront is so distasteful, maybe we should route the Viaduct traffic around West Seattle and be rid of that horrid blight we call "Alki" once and for all. After all, we were once threatened with a "Seattle Commons" and fortunately were able to ensure that only condos, office buildings and hotels were built in its place.