Features Dec 4, 2019 at 4:00 am

A look at two plans that would totally change the city.

A lid over I-5 with housing, retail, art spaces, and parks built on top could pay for making the freeway safer. City of Seattle

Comments

1

"Cities around the country—including Dallas, New York, Chicago, and Washington, DC— have followed the example of Freeway Park and designed and built lids."

The DC project Lester's referring to here is the Third Street Tunnel. It put a lid on the section of I-395 between Chinatown and Capitol Hill, on which a developer is building a massive project called Capitol Crossing.

I lived across a small park from the construction site and witnessed the whole thing over a period of several years. The lid was built between 2014 and 2018, and the full development is still several years from completion.

It's hard to overstate how disruptive the process was. The general contractor took over the entire park and trashed it by turning it into a staging area; years after they were supposed to relinquish and restore it, it's still filled with materials and portable buildings used as construction offices. They jacked up a historic synagogue and left it in the middle of a street, reducing it to a single lane, for a couple of years. There was endless piledriving, dust everywhere, and gridlock throughout the neighborhood during the times they had to close the freeway and reroute traffic.

Was it worth it? For the city, I guess so since it restored the street grid through the area to L'Enfant's original design. For me, mostly no. On one hand, it was fascinating to watch it all come together from my place on an upper floor with floor-to-ceiling windows that directly faced the site. On the other, it was a giant hassle, and it resulted in an ungainly new freeway entrance portal being installed in the middle of the street right in front of my building. And I ended up selling my condo this summer, not long after the worst phase of the project had been finished.

Lidding I-5 would be a great thing for Seattle. It would also be a nightmare that takes longer than the most pessimistic estimate and impacts the surrounding neighborhood in ways that no one can predict.

3

Hey, but maybe you'll have better luck than we did with the District Department of Transportation and its Chief Product Delivery Officer at the time, a guy named [checks notes] Sam Zimbabwe.

4

I remember reading an article in one of those extra periodicals that came with the Seattle Sunday paper - not Parade, the other one - about the original plans WSDOT had for Puget Sound's freeway system. In addition to what we have now, it called for SR-509 to be solid freeway from where it ends now in Burien all the way to Tacoma, and a second Eastside loop freeway (I-605, if you will) that took the route that SR-18 takes through Auburn up to Snoqualmie before reconnecting to I-5 much further north - maybe along the same highway above the marshes between Everett and Lake Stevens that US-2 uses now. Had those freeways been finished, maybe I-5 could be closed off at the I-90 interchange, with the long-range truck travel rerouted along that outer-loop freeway. But lidding I-5 through downtown is the best solution, or at least the least-worst solution. But I just can't see any of this happening until those enthralled by Little Timmy Lie Man and his sugar daddies are brought back to consciousness.

5

There is simply no political will to eliminate rights of way. Even locally getting rid of a few hundred feet of road is generally so toxic that it's a non-starter.

I love the idea of a lid. The gash of I-5 straight through the city is a real missed opportunity. Giving how much of the freeway is already covered it wouldn't change its character much for drivers but would radically transform the city above.

7

What we need is an alternative to cars. Growth is going to happen, whether we prepare for it or not. This city, and the entire I-5 corridor, is going to see a massive increase in population over the next ten years. By having only one means of traveling between Olympia and Seattle, or through Centralia at the Outlet Malls, and forcing everyone onto that same roadway, you’re going to create gridlock.

Tacoma looks like a never ending construction project, WSDOT just keeps adding new freeways as if that’s the only thing they know how to do. And traffic just keeps getting worse there. The roadway building project isn’t working.

Build a comprehensive light rail system that runs from the Canadian border to the Oregon border. It has To be extensive enough to get around all I-5’s chokepoints. Build access roads alongside I-5 and ban large trucks from the freeway during rush hour. Bring back the Mosquito Fleet so people can get around on ferry boats without driving.

Ten years from now, this state will be the fourth or third most populous in the country. We either prepare now or suffer later.

8

@2 I think you're right that we will never intentionally decide through a political process to eliminate I-5 through Seattle. But what happens when it falls down from neglect?

In days of yore, our ancestors raised the tax revenues to assemble the right-of-ways and build these things without resorting to kludges like leasing lid space to real estate developers. Government had so much money it could just write a check. Now we can't find the cash to replace a few pillars.

9

Everything you are wearing, everything you ate today, arrived on a diesel truck that drove on our roads. Yes, we should move toward a better system, but you can tax fossil fuels all you want it won't happen overnight.
If you actually think "deleting" I-5 is possible or a good idea, I would like you compare I-5 to your main artery. Please tell me what would happen to you if you cut off your main artery...
As for putting a lid over I-5... hahahahaahahahahaahahahahahahahaha. The Ship Canal Bridge and Aurora bridge need to be replaced in the next 10-30 years... unless an Earthquake knocks them out first. We don't have time or money to waste on fanciful dreams that would be really great, if we didn't have 1 million other things to do first.
Seriously, pass more regressive taxation hurting the poor and elderly please.

10

Remember, real countries are using electric trucks and electric trains, and even making trains go as fast as planes, while you waste tax dollars on roads that only destroy the planet, and order things for next day delivery that you don't need that fast.

Obviously we should replace half of I-5 with high speed passenger and freight rail, going at 300 mph.

11

@7 "Ten years from now, this state will be the fourth or third most populous in the country. "

Say what now? In a mere 10 years, Washington (7.5 million) is going to grow its population to match California (40 million), Texas (29 million), Florida (20 million), and New York (19 million)? Show your work.

12

@11 ...maybe in relative terms other states will radically decline due to climate effects?

I suppose when the observed effects of climate driven sea level rises swallow up large swaths of Florida coast (where all the big cities are) we might be able to take that slot. Manhattan will also be a quarter underwater unless the new sea walls and canal systems are built.

But that’s not happening in ten years (unless projections are wrong). But. Thirty? Oh yeah. Florida is definitely fucked.

13

@11 Also can you imagine what living in Arizona, Nevada and Texas is going to be like in ten-twenty-thirty years? It’s already approaching unlivable in summer months. And Arizona and Texas don’t have ten years of water to sustain current populations.

So. Maaaaybe climate refugees from the Southwest move north? Not sure how’d those ageing mouth breathing Red State dipshits would afford Washington housing prices though.

14

We should start with making I-5 northbound safer. There needs to be one more through lane which could be created by using one less exit lane. This would remove the bottleneck that happens at the entrance to northbound express lanes.

16

First Mudede's column the other day blaming the recent carnage on Aurora on "car culture," and actually blaming the pedestrians as well. But no, pay no attention to the psychotic tweaker behind the wheel. I'm sure the victims' family appreciated the sentiment.

Now we have this drivel. I'm not sure what's more laughable and preposterous: Spending untold billions of dollars to build parks for drug-addled vagrants to take over? And not only that, but to give them free "affordable" housing on what would be the most expensive and desirable real estate in the city?

But wait, why not just tear down I-5 all together, it's not like anyone needs it. God forbid we actually put our tax dollars into something useful like bridge and highway maintenance.

Just listen to Doug Trumm, he knows whats the rest of us hayseeds, because he writes for The Urbanist! He "thinks" it can be mediated. Cars and freight will magically hop over to 405. Nevermind going miles and hours out of their way, creating utter gridlock, and spewing more carbon emissions while they sit and stew in anger.

These urbanist zealots are deliberately trying to create misery in our region to advance their agenda. It's time we view them as the enemy instead of as just harmless deluded dogooders.

17

Provocative propositions, both of them, and well presented.
Can't see I-5 being shuttered in the scant remainders of my lifetime, it was actually quite well constructed with prudent engineering overkill. Should last for another generation anyway.
I'm on board with the lid and see the potential for self-financing.
but let's cut the bullshit.
It's not going to be parks and play spaces and art spaces and affordable housing and rainbows and unicorns.
It is going to be super expensive soulless office space and ridiculously-priced retail and luxury condos in a hideous melange of architectural atrocities. We know that. Don't piss on our heads and tell us its raining.
But it still would be worth doing.

18

One of the biggest impediments to traffic flow on I-5 through downtown Seattle is the Seattle Convention Center, which owns land on both sides of the freeway. Northbound, traffic lanes are forced from four lanes to two as traffic is diverted to the express lanes, then to Seneca Streety. Yet nobody mentions that sacred cow. Solve that before putting a lid over the mess.

19

11, of the states you mention, only Texas is not experiencing negative population growth.

Washington has for the past twenty years experienced explosive population growth. This has accelerated in the past decade, partly due to economic development, partly due to an expansion of worker’s rights and an increase in wages, and partly due to progressives from other parts of the country moving into areas where the existing political climate matches their personal sentiment.

In 1993, Puyallup was a rural backwater. Dupont didn’t exist, and Lakewood was just a mall. Tacoma rents started as low as 200 bucks. Now, the population density of Pierce County is massive, and we are experiencing traffic nightmares secondary to not having planned for growth.

To pretend that this expansion will not continue to accelerate and to refuse to plan for it requires either a mental defect or willful ignorance.

20

Very interesting proposals. I've lived in a city that ditched its highways. It was fine. People drove less. Of course it should be paired with public transit improvements. And of course the sort of regional transit cooperation required is politically impossible in Washington.

The lid is a great compromise idea. Expect it to be implemented, if at all, as an overly extravagant bandaid solution in rich neighborhoods only.

There's no money for civic infrastructure any more. To make a long stort short, we've decided that we'd rather have billionaires than money for public investment. We'll push this system until it collapses. Then, if politics are as they are now, we'll privatize the solution or some other such benefit for corporate and moneyed interests. If there's no corporate power play to be made, we'll just let it die, hap what may.

If politics are different... say there was a single political party that believed in the value of the public sphere... maybe when the system collapses we can try to solve the problem in a comprehensive forward looking way.

21

@19 I'm sure WA state will continue to gain population. I was questioning the assertion that our population will go from 7.5 million to over 20 million in 10 years.

24

Ike's Interstate Highway System was a marvel when it came about in the late 50s to the mid 60s. Before then, you were at the mercy of mostly two-laned travel through hamlets and villages and cities on US and state highways. Some were notorious radar speed traps. With the Interstate, they told us, you could go coast-to-coast without ever encountering a stop light.

Interstate commerce was the big winner, but something was lost as well. All those wonderful little tourist stops on the highway disappeared as did a lot of the flavor of going from, say, the plains of the Midwest to the palmy beaches of Florida. On the interstate, Louisiana looks like Illinois or Georgia which looked like Maryland. Doesn't much matter if you are hauling goods, but if you are doing a road trip vacation, you are missing a lot of scenery.

The Interstate Highway System got it wrong though with cities - the cities where it plows through the middle of town. In Nashville, where I was a child when this thing was shaping up, five interstate highways converge. It was a mess for a while. Fortunately, none of them really divide the city like I-5 does to Seattle. When I first landed in Seattle back in early 1987, I fell in deep and abiding love with this glorious town. but when I crossed my first pedestrian bridge over I-5, I wondered about the highway below me, "Who the fuck put this here?" Reminded me of Robert Moses and all the neighborhoods he essentially destroyed with his highways through Manhattan and other boroughs.

Lidding I-5 or tearing it up seems like a fever dream. I'd be for either one with my preference being tearing it up. Freeway Park is a remarkable thing, but it's noisy. In the late 60s and early 70s the Interstate Highway System realized its mistake and started building city bypasses. Of course, that's when Washington had will and could agree on worthwhile projects.

25

21,

NY state is undergoing rapid negative population growth, most of it outside of the City. There just isn’t much incentive for young people to live in Buffalo or Rochester. NY’s population is aging and the state’s system benefits its older constituents at the expense of its younger inhabitants. They’re priced out of the City, which has for decades been managed for the sole benefit of the wealthier inhabitants. AOC won not because her constituents thought she was a great brand or a marketable personality. She won because her constituents are desperate.

And they’re even more desperate Upstate.

If that bleed continues, and Washington continues to accelerate its growth we will surpass NY within a decade. Young people have strong incentives to move here. Our wages are high, outside of the Seattle metro area the state is affordable, employment is good, we are very progressive and becoming moreso every year. Inslee’s Presidential bid was a clarion call to progressives across the country that if they don’t like the local politics wherever they are now, Washington State is the place to move.

Why stay in New York and die in poverty while the gerontocracy shuts you out of the conversation, when you can move to Washington, live well, and have the state legislature take your ideas seriously? Look at the stuff young people care about, Global Warming, the environment, civil rights for women and LGBT people, worker’s rights, those aren’t just far away fantasies to save for some far off future someday. We already put it all into law, and we’re doing even more every year. The state where more donors than any other gave to Bernie’s campaign? Washington. The state which passed Marriage Equality by referendum before anyone else did? Washington. The first state to legalize recreational pot? Washington. We tick every goddamn box, all the way down the line.

This right here is the only state worth living in or caring about. We are the best America has to offer. And anyone who looks at us even for a second can see that.

This is heaven. You don’t have to wait until your dead to see it. It’s right here.

26

@25- interesting perspective. I needed that today, thx.

27

@25 NY State and California are losing population while Texas grows?

Try high taxes and high cost of living. Apparently liberal states are only affordable to rich liberals.

28

@27 well, dipshit, then why have the Flyovers in low tax Red State Dumbfuckistan been steadily decaying and dying for thirty years? Just look at the success of Kansas. Bang up job, rightwing!

You’ll note that the rich but expensive cities keep growing and it’s the rural shitholes dying out in NYC and California. And everywhere else.

Because young people don’t want to live in shit holes dominated by the regressive suicidal policies of the mouth breathing rightwing.

I mean, fuck. Make up your idiotic mind. Is the population growth in major cities creating scarcity in the mighty market and driving up real estate prices bad or good? What a conundrum.

There is one reason and one reason alone why Texas has experienced growth. The oil industry. And the incredible amount of socialism... er, I mean government incentives given to it in Texas.

And mr. trolling dipshit, once oil and natural gas is no longer economically viable Texas, which is running out of water, will dry up and blow the fuck away.

I realize somehow California is mythically symbolic of LIBRUL EBIL to you because of Buttsecks and Hollywierd or whatever Rush Limbaugh bullshit, but you don’t even get that right. There is conservative rural California and liberal urban California. Like everywhere else. And it’s rural California that is fucked because of the morons they elect that do stupid shit, oh, like starting idiotic trade wars and implementing tariffs of their farm exports and Chinese imports.

Even with that California has still has twice the GDP of Texas with only 10 million more people. Poverty rates in Texas are also higher. Texas merely sucks up the second rate youth populations who don’t go to the coasts from their dying Dumbfuckistan shot holes. But regular 120 degree days will see that blow away, too.

31

This must be "The Urbanist" tribute week. First an article about Nathan Vass, now an article about two ideas that both gained prominence in the other blog.

Anyway, extending freeway park (in some form or another) is a worthy goal. The biggest weakness with the existing park is its design. Brutalist architecture has its place, but is a bad choice over a freeway. You want the opposite -- something open and lively -- like Cal Anderson Park. Working in a few buildings is fine, but the biggest value comes in better integrating Capitol Hill with downtown.

32

Removing I-5 in downtown Seattle is a radical idea, and likely won't come to pass. But it is worth pointing out that Vancouver BC does not have a freeway running through it, while we have two. It is likely we could get by with just SR 99. We already have a bypass freeway, called I-405.

It would require a big adjustment, but saying this will lead to constant gridlock ignores the fluid nature of driving. Drivers adjust. It takes time, but eventually they find different ways around the city, many of which don't include driving. Once a city reaches a certain level of automobile use, adding lanes on the freeways (or new freeways) doesn't help. Lanes were added on I-90, and traffic is as bad as ever. That's because people who didn't use to drive (when traffic was bad) suddenly found driving appealing when the added the lanes, and next thing you know, traffic reached the same (bad, but tolerable) levels. This is known as induced demand. The opposite is true as well. Traffic through the city would be bad -- Aurora would be much more crowded -- but people would use transit more, and most streets would be similar to what they are now (not that busy in the middle of the day, crowded during rush hour).

It helps that the mass transit system parallels I-5, and is relatively close to it. Trips that a generation ago would have seemed perfectly normal (driving from the U-District to downtown) will seem ridiculous very soon (it is faster to just take the train). As Link extends north, to Northgate, the public transit alternative becomes more attractive. Public transit will also abandon the freeway. The 71, 72, 73 and 74 used to get on the freeway in the U-District and get off downtown. They don't anymore. When Link gets to Northgate, most of the buses will terminate there. When Link gets to Lynnwood (a few years after that) it is quite likely that we won't have a single bus on I-5 between I-90 and 520, making the loss of that part of the freeway meaningless to the vast majority of commuters, if not travelers in the city. It is a radical idea, but if fixing I-5 costs a bundle, then simply removing it might be the best possible choice.

33

Stop calling them "lidded parks". They're not parks with lids on them.

34

Yea, covering I5 with regular buildings is a massive upgrade over leaving it open. If the land values are high enough to make such projects self-funding I'm for building as much of it as we can.

35

Yes. All homeless encampments over and under. And more ballots delivered and picked up there next election.

36

Baron Haussmann and Napoleon III effected a vast and wildly expensive and disruptive project in Paris to overlay the medieval city with a modern plan and infrastructure. Perhaps Baron Black and Supreme Leader Sawant I could do the same but in reverse in Seattle? that would be cool.

37

Lidding I-5 isn't such a bad idea. In addition to being a means to upgrade the existing east-west bridges with something more substantial (earthquake-proof) it will have the side effect of eliminating a lot of the downtown on and off ramps. Presently, Seattle has gotten away with using I-5 as its own north-south arterial network for city connections. You need to go north or south in Seattle? Just jump on I-5 for a few blocks. This isn't what the interstate system was originally intended for. It was for city to city and state to state travel. Once lidded and many of the downtown ramps cut off, Seattle will be arm-twisted into building a proper arterial road system. I-5 volumes will be reduced by moving local traffic back onto local roads.

38

Nope, nope, nope, our side roads cannot accommodate increased volumes of semi-trucks. The wear and tear would jam up side streets in addition to our highway parking lot situation. What if carpooling, vanpooling, and buses were prioritized during peak hours? Everyone sign up for a driving barcode/pass,or create car tabs built with that technology, and add more highway cameras. During peak hours carpools, vanpools, and buses can drive on the highway. Single drivers get one free pass on the highway during peak times a week. Fine people for exceeding the one free pass per week. Companies can receive small tax incentives to create vanpool drop offs in their parking lots and encourage carpooling. Companies with more single drivers pay slightly higher taxes. People and companies with extenuating circumstances can apply for allowances. Each year the allowances require renewal and proof of circumstances. The state shall increase their auditing to ensure companies and individuals were complying. Commercial trucks(including farmers) stay on the highway to be re-evaluated at a later time (with a 5 year period). Any annual revenue is dumped into more lightrail projects spanning from Canada to Portland. Increase the number of board members on the transportation committee. The transportation committe should be a mixed socioeconomic group representing the whole of Washington state. Budgeting should include telecommuting options for a broad range(geographically) for committee members and also cover any loss of wages for those attending meetings. That is all.


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