Where are the plans for the surface street + transit option?

On the third image, what left to right cross street is that? Denny?

@2: That would be Mercer, after they've finished the Mercer realignment to make it eight lanes wide and two-way. This giant orifice will basically sit where Broad St is now.

So is that mess on the left hand side of the 1st 2 pics the waterfront we are so determined to reclaim? Pretty.

Do you guys hate all tunnels, or just this one?

shouldn't a seattle of the future be a place where people are driving less? Isn't the car age over? Or has it just begun--as these drawings would suggest. I would like to see a photo of all the employees of the WA state department of trans, outside in a parking lot sitting on their cars. The funny thing, is that in 30 years were gonna have aging & senile boomers wishing they had an easier way to go to the store and get the prescriptions filled, buy groceries, etc.

Top of the waterfront photos show a very wide 6+1 boulevard. You know what it's primarily for?

No, not tour buses. Guess again.

Yup, freight! Freight can't go into the tunnel, but there's no waterfront restriction planned. Essentially that 6+1 boulevard will be a lovely new freight corridor since they won't upgrade freight throughput on I-5 (no money).

That's what Ivar's wanted, right?

Lots of grass on there. What'll it look like in November?

And is that going to be human-accessible? A nice big grassy park? Or just walled off, window dressing for the drivers?

@5 just this one.

We love the bus tunnel, and the ALRT tunnel up in Vancouver, for example, but those are both built ABOVE SEA LEVEL and were designed for freight/coal trains in the first place.

Hey Dominic, it's not cement, it's concrete. There's a difference. Cement is what binds together the things that make up concrete (sand, gravel and water). I'm not trying to be pedantic, but it's a mistake that's made all the time even by journalists.

@5 - only ones w/o dedicated skateboard lanes.

@4 this awful tunnel is going to ruin our views of those shipping containers, railroad yards, and loading cranes. There will be a monstrous and ugly expanse of concrete where there was once a smaller and obviously more attractive expanse of concrete. You won't be able to walk up to that chain link fence and root around among the windblown garbage and peer at parked construction equipment anymore! It's an outrage.

Wow, that's a highway engineer's wet dream right there. As many overpasses and ramps as possible. I also notice that almost every ramp leading into the tunnel goes from 3 lanes to 2 or from 2 lanes to 1, which highway engineers love for some reason but is exactly what causes choke points and congestion. If the tunnel is 2 lanes in each direction, then the total number of lanes entering the portal should be 2! Instead they have 3 lanes converging to 2 right at the portal. Traffic should be metered at an earlier point. They should also do variable tolling based on demand management, not based on how much revenue they want.

@17 - no, in picture 1 you're seeing two lanes exiting the tunnel with an off ramp. The other pictures don't show anything like the bottleneck you're describing.

@4 - those are the massive shipping terminals that currently exist. They aren't going anywhere, and we don't want them to because they are a major part of the city's economy and tax base.

@7 - that isn't a 6 lane road along the waterfront. It's two lane with bike lanes. Most trucks will head from the Port to I-5 and I-90 along the new overpasses near the stadia and the new Spokane Street Viaduct. Only commercial traffic heading for Ballard or Wallingford would likely use Alaskan Way. You can see a better rendering of the new waterfront at http://www.flickr.com/photos/wsdot/49073…

@17 - no, in picture 1 you're seeing two lanes exiting the tunnel with an off ramp. The other pictures don't show anything like the bottleneck you're describing.

@4 - those are the massive shipping terminals that currently exist. They aren't going anywhere, and we don't want them to because they are a major part of the city's economy and tax base.

@7 - that isn't a 6 lane road along the waterfront. It's two lane with bike lanes. Most trucks will head from the Port to I-5 and I-90 along the new overpasses near the stadia and the new Spokane Street Viaduct. Only commercial traffic heading for Ballard or Wallingford would likely use Alaskan Way. You can see a better rendering of the new waterfront at http://www.flickr.com/photos/wsdot/49073…

What a waste all that extended Mercer Freeway Ramp is. It should be sunk and lidded with parks and other things on top.

What a waste all that extended Mercer Freeway Ramp is. It should be sunk and lidded with parks and other things on top.

Look at those sad pedestrians on the Aurora sidewalks. Vvvvoom vvvooommm!

From Harrison, the northbound entrance is onto SR99's passing left Lane. That means a high-speed entrance to match the high speeds of traffic on the right, some driving SR99 northbound awaiting the left lane to pass. That's what you call regrettable engineering. There's probably a better way to do this. Don't expect Wsdot to reveal or spend any time refining a better option. Wsdot is corrupt.

It' a disgrace, this bored tunnel, the worst choice foisted upon honest and dishonestly misinformed citizens. It is an intentional perversion of sensible engineering design and practice.

I charge Wsdot & SDOT with criminal wrongdoing.

The agencies wrongfully distorted their studies and planning process toward indeed, pre-determined outcomes. An unnecessary lengthening of the planning process was meant to bombard citizens with an overwhelming plethora of least worthy options for tunnels & transit & pedestrian & bicycling & streetcar & trolleybus & public park OPTIONS.

Agency REFUSAL to answer pertinent & critical questions is irresponsible unaccountability.
The years of dishonest planning is a heist of the public treasury.
Look at Wsdot's pretty pictures of progress promised.
Look at their Columbia River Bridge recently rejected as engineering folly.
The DBT is an engineering catastrophe in the making. A risk far beyond reasonable.
"Oh, don't worry" THEY say.
Look at their previoius abject failures and count this one as among their worst.
Have a nice day, quitters?

@23 oh my god, that'll be a fun merge on my moped. At least now, when I'm ripping down Aurora at the bike's top speed, I get to merge into the right hand lane with the buses and slow trucks. It's gonna be so much fun hopping on from the left, with people roaring out of the tunnel on my right.

Yup, we're gonna need photo-enforcement of speed limits here.

@25 Lack Thereof makes a detailed engineering point.

In the background, Seattle's vast wannabee chorus warbles "Duhhh, huhhh, whaaat?"

The bored tunnel's blatant engineering flaws are atrocious.

And again the Seattle transit wannabees refrain, "Duhhh, huhhh, whaaat?"