Can we get a Refund?

The Viaduct was supposed to come down in 2012 and it's a very very very very big risk, all for a Vanity Tunnel that Seattle voted against.

It feels like there should be some kind of plan B when the developer falls behind two years on such a major project while traffic becomes an ever-increasing nightmare. I bet they still turn a profit. Contracts sure are great.

would you rather they started the boring before they're sure it's ready?

So what? As if anyone is really inconvenienced now by a later date three or four years from now.

@3 & 4...are you both really that daft?

Does anyone honestly, truly believe they are going to start working two days before x-mas?

What @6 said. So: sometime next year, maybe.

Bruce Harrell!!!!

We can't stop now... BECAUSE SUNK COST FALLACY!!!

I really feel badly for the project team. This must be an ordeal from hell.

So we should rush the job to satisfy the Stranger and it's oh-so-entitled readers in the comment section? You can hate on the state and STP and whomever else you want to yell at, but the workers on the ground are probably working their damn asses off trying to get the job done. Does the viaduct need to come down? Yes, duh. But we can't tear it down until something else is in place, and what else would that be but the project we're already working on? In my view, the initial planning of this project was the problem and the initial construction of the machine. Now that they've realized that, I'm glad they're taking the time to fix. There's no way this thing is getting abandoned, despite all the whining, it's too big to cancel.

December 23rd -- just in time for a nice Christmas vacation.

What is wrong with the surface option? Cut the losses and just pave some 6 lane street there with pedestrian bridges to the waterfront. I know that the development minded assholes don't want this but reality is reality. And no, Seattle, as said above, did not vote for this.

@5: well, I'm not, but raindrop is.

WGAF about a 1 month delay in the re-start? do you? it's people who think it's time to throw in the towel that are daft. if it breaks down again, it won't be retrievable. get it dialed in.

the Stranger sounds like Dori Monson on this project. it does not become them.

@13: what is wrong is that WSDOT and the Port and think it won't work and this is the bar they've set for pulling down that deathtrap/eyesore. I agree it would have been best.

Vancouver, BC is now considering removing all its viaducts into the city, but leaving only surface streets. So far no mention of tunnels.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-co…

@12: and when they announce the next big delay, they can now do it during the holidays when no one will be paying attentiom?!

The tunnel will never be finished - and even if by some miracle it is somehow finished, it will never be used.

Someone brought up I think at "we hope you're enjoying your limited access" Seattle Times that what if it does get stuck under downtown? A new "repair pit" will not be feasible. I say retrofit it. And to those who think it's ugly, I disagree. It's part of the city. Pioneer Square is ugly to some too and should be torn down like Ballard. I like and don't mind the viaduct.

Plan B for Bertha:
Redirect the bore along the seawall to a Pike/Pine Portal, about 2000' further. Continue the rows of concrete piers on both sides of the bore its entire length. These piers make a stronger seawall and offer the means to stabilize soils between. Retain Battery Street Tunnel and extend to Harrison - similarly reconnecting the Denny Triangle grid. For Lower Belltown, there are several options to remove the overhead and connect SR99 - a 2-stoplight interchange or rebuilding beneath Western/Elliott with access ramps. Either should work fine. This Plan B would certainly cost more. However, if the proposed bore is finished, catastrophic failure is highly probable because the deeper, longer bore amplifies destructive forces of an earthquake in unstable soils beneath vulnerable historic and modern buildings. Washington State Highway Robbery department bastards are plotting liberal murder.

Extra weight created by all the new steel reinforcing has caused a lot of weight problems. As the head turns it is distorting sufficiently to cause seal leakage. doesn't look good. Two tunnels with proven technology would have worked. Christine needs to be taken to the wood shed.

Twin tunnels though smaller would have the same destabilizing affect upon watery, soluable soils beneath vulnerable buildings above. Shortening the bore tunnel length - from 8200' to 2000' - by immediately ascending along the seawall is the only stable route and wouldn't be possible with twin tunnels. Wsdot rigged their studies before and after the 2007 voter referendum. Conservative Wsdot department heads dispise Seattle liberalism and are plotting a cataclysmic disaster they can blame on natural forces in obeisent service to
their gods: power and control.

@15 - City of Vancouver can't put a tunnel where our viaducts currently are because the land is more like infill. 100 years ago it was an inlet/swamp. Getting rid of them for surface isn't even the worst idea but everybody here knows that the real reason they are coming down is to make some developers a metric fuck-ton of money (that's about 1.8 American fuck-tons, I believe).

I prefer just to say that I'm the world's largest tunnel boring machine. That "Broken" bit is just mean and unnecessary.
@BerthaDeBlues

Put up a big stink, Bertha, or throw a nasty tantrum when those Wsdot bastards start you up again. You don't want to go down in history as a white trash assassin's murderous bomb.

I know to a lot of people this sounds dumb. But I remain confident that this will get completed. Yes, it will get done over budget and behind schedule, but it will get completed.

Why am I so confident? Because 99 percent do. One only needs to start looking at the forest and not just one single tree. Sound Transit's TBMs have completed 7 of 10 tunnel drives ahead of schedule and on budget. The 8th of those 10 tunnel drives should breakthrough at the University Station also on time in the next 2 months. Leaving only the 2 last segments left between downtown an Northgate to be completed. Crossrail in London just completed 42 kilometers of tunneling under London, all ahead of schedule. There are countless TBMs all over the world completing tunnels. That includes, New York, DC, Florida, Nevada, Illinois, California, BC, Ontario, Mexico, Brazil Argentina Saudi Arabia Russia, Italy, Germany, Spain, New Zealand, China and so on and so on.

It is unfortunate that Bertha had a major break down but this isn't the first or the worst tunneling failure. Most people hardly even know about the long delay with Brightwater, but that got completed.

Large construction projects have risks but the world is better for us taking those risks. The first tunnel ever to run under a river, the river Thames took 18 years to build and went about a half a kilometer. That project was shut down for 7 years. But would we have tunnels under rivers and bodies of water today if it wasn't completed?

Bertha has not only been repaired but significant modifications have been made to ensure that it completes the drive once it restarts it's drive. Personally I'm glad that they are not rushing Bertha back know into service. I say take the time now to get it right.

Bertha!

Yeah!

eee