Virgin on Biz The boring (tunnel) details

Seattle is actually going to replace the viaduct with a tunnel; it will be entertaining and instructive to see how it gets built.

Bill Virgin | November 2011 | FROM THE PRINT EDITION

So we’re going to build the darn thing.

After years of arguing and studying and foot dragging and a few votes that may or may not have meant anything, we’re finally going to start digging the tunnel that will replace the Alaskan Way Viaduct and carry State Route 99’s traffic through Seattle.

That may be the greatest accomplishment in this saga. Never mind if the tunnel gets built on time or within hailing distance of its budget or if the viaduct gets taken down without mishap or the tunnel works the way it’s supposed to. The fact that a decision was made by elected officials—some of them, anyway—is deserving of a plaque of recognition somewhere near the tunnel entrance.

Getting to this happy day was the product of not only overcoming a Seattle process that is tipped toward delay and indecision, but also the result of distracting and spurious arguments offered by both sides.

On the pro-viaduct side, the case has been made that losing the elevated highway means losing great views of Elliott Bay. If you, the motorist, are sightseeing from the viaduct, then you’re not paying enough attention to the traffic, such as that stalled truck just ahea…WHUMP.

The anti-viaduct camp, meanwhile, argued that tearing down the structure would remove an unpardonable blight on the city, one that sent people fleeing in terror, ears covered from the roar of traffic. If you’re of such fragile constitution that the sound of cars passing nearby is too much to bear, your absence probably hasn’t been missed by the tourists and city dwellers who somehow managed to brave the horrific conditions to stroll the waterfront.

Time spent wrangling over those issues diverted attention from legitimate concerns raised by both sides.

Those who wanted the viaduct shored up or replaced or, failing that, a tunnel, were right to be concerned with lost traffic-carrying capacity in a region short of north-south through routes. The “we’ll replace it with nothing” option was never a serious, adult proposal. The tunnel preserves that travel corridor (although Seattle’s mayor would likely prefer a highway with no exit ramps, all the better to keep the hated automobile out of town).

Speaking of Mayor Mike McGinn, as fun as lampooning his increasingly isolated position on the tunnel was, he was absolutely right to raise this issue: Who gets stuck with the tab, especially if it costs a bit more than what’s been promised?

He had plenty of precedent upon which to base that question. We quote here from the Wikipedia entry for Boston’s Central Artery/Tunnel Project, known to thee and me as the Big Dig (which also replaced an elevated highway): “The most expensive highway project in the U.S. … was plagued by escalating costs, scheduling overruns, leaks, design flaws, charges of poor execution and use of substandard materials, criminal arrests and even four deaths.”

Nor did he need to go so far afield to cite problematic projects: From Galloping Gertie to WPPSS to the I-90 sinking bridge to Sound Transit’s light rail, Washington has had its own track record of construction debacles, spiraling costs and, on occasion, both.

But sometimes stuff gets built in this state, even big stuff. Grand Coulee Dam still works. The Space Needle is a globally recognizable emblem of the city. The Tacoma Narrows is now spanned by not one but two bridges. Whatever one thinks of buildings like EMP or the downtown Seattle Public Library, they got built and people come to see them. I-90 through the westside approaches to Snoqualmie Pass still has the capacity to impress as an engineering feat.

So having accomplished the seemingly impossible once—hacking through the impenetrable thicket of Seattle non-decision making—the planners and designers and engineers and construction workers will be asked to carry out an equally Herculean task: digging and building the tunnel without having to shore it up with stacks of dollar bills.

Accomplishing both will prove necessary to achieve what we want. Only one of them is likely to make us feel at all proud about what we’ve built or optimistic about what project we might take on next.

BILL VIRGIN is the founder and editor of the Washington Manufacturing Alert and the Pacific Northwest Rail News.