I stopped reading his blog a while ago. It seems like he's become eccentric, crabby, or too bored with blogging to make sense.

Okay, I understand David Sucher is a retrofit supporter. What I don't understand is why David Sucher is going after Peter Steinbrueck of all people concerning the retrofit. It isn't Steinbrueck who ruled the retrofit isn't feasible; he's in no position to. It's the Washington State "Department of Highways" Sucher should take issue with.

BTW, I've gotta say that, of all the public figures talking about the viaduct issue, Peter Steinbrueck has done the best job of focusing on and capturing the outrage and shame of a new viaduct. It seems like the "good guys" have been so caught up in their internecine squabbling -- tunnel vs. surface, tunnel vs. surface -- that they have lost track of the real common threat. When Steinbrueck says he would gladly give up his job if it would somehow prevent another viaduct from going up, I know he isn't posturing because I know where he's coming from.

These two ballot measures, advisory though they are, are obviously going to frame the viaduct debate for the next month and a half. Pro-or-con rebuild. Pro-or-con four-lane tunnel. With that in mind, I can only hope that the retrofit crowd will reject the rebuild.

Actually, I think they will. It makes sense because, if both ballot measures go down to defeat, the state will likely shift the gas-tax money to 520. And once that happens, a retrofit becomes a more likely scenario than a teardown.

So I guess what I'm saying is, perhaps David Sucher and cohorts should be focusing their energies on getting two no's.

I can't wait until the state take thes Viaduct down and then attempts to put another one up.

Not going to happen.

Any attempt to rebuild a stinking Viaduct would result in rioting that would make the WTO look tame.

One might think that Nick Licata and Frank Chopp would get this.

Seems like they are both telling us now that we elected them to use all their powers to push for a bigger noisier freeway over the waterfront.

Could their plotting together be any more obvious?

What planet are these guys on.

Maybe the fun of their youth is starting to muddle their thinking.

We need to rise up and save the city from Chopp, Licata and the state highway department.

Actually, Dan, that is a good argument that I haven't heard mentioned much, and that I hadn't really given much thought to.

If we did not have a viaduct at all right now, and we decided that traffic was getting too heavy, and we needed to find some relief for people commuting from SW Seattle and the freight terminals, would anyone, even for a minute, seriously consider constructing a huge, double-decker concrete monstrosity, slicing between downtown and the waterfront like a giant scar? Not on your life.

We might consider a tunnel. We might consider a light rail line to get people out of their cars. We might consider double-decking I-5 going through downtown. We might consider more buses. We might utilize rail more for moving freight, rather than trucks through down town. People might find other small solutions on their own, like working different hours so they can commute on the off peak hours. There may be other ways of dealing with the problem. But I'm positive that if anyone suggested building an ugly viaduct right through the city if it didn't already exist, they'd get laughed out of town.

So why are we considering doing it again?

My comment is of course not just aimed at Peter but at the whole Council and Mayor etc etc. I like Peter and other Councilmembers have indeed been far more irresponsible on this issue. But it is a particular irony in Peter's case that he has been part of the public chorus that the Viaduct cannot be Repaired. (Or so that is my undersatnding of Peter's position -- if I am wrong and he is open to the idea of a Retrofit then I will apologize heartily, sincerely and happily for misstating his view.)

At any rate, the big issue, (which Dan, Erica etc still refuse to face,) is that the Viaduct can be repaired and that the studies about it have been stacked to come up with alternatives which are either unaffordable (Tunnel) or absurd (Rebuild). I share the frustration of the Surface people that the WSDOT studies have not been fair-handed -- but that fair-handed analysis should include Reapiring the Viaduct, at least in the short run until we can develop the infrastructure to allow us to tear it down.

•••
More broadly, as a commenter to my post Majority Delusion
http://citycomfortsblog.typepad.com/cities/2007/01/nicely_put.html
put it:

"People who urge tearing down the Seattle viaduct ASAP because of the Nisqually earthquake remind me of politicians who insisted on invading Iraq because of the 9-11 attacks."

•••

Btw, anyone not crabby about the state of Seattle politics should reconsider. The city is a political mess....and uh...the Viaduct situation (no matter what one's views) a case in point.

So I saw this photo of Chopp the other day (on TV I think it was) dude looks like he has really been hitting the buffet line since his "official" cheesy-mustache portrait was taken for his web page. I think he might be turing into Dennis Hastert (well, visually)...how did this clown end up getting elected, much less with enough power to hold this entire city hostage. Way to go, voters of the 43rd District-- we all owe you one....

The part that throws me is the "gentrifying city with a waterfront" line. Is the idea here that "gentrifying" - otherwise known as rising property values - is something to be avoided? Should we instead be planning mass urban blight to escape this scourge? Oh right - that'd be the rebuild. I guess it is a coherent point - my bad.

Um, yeah, if you want to preserve the character of our wonderful city (not the mention the ability of a lot of our longtime residents to remain here), gentrification kind of does suck. Funny, progressives used to think that.

The AWV/SR 99 has been there for 50 years, and much of the region has grown up around it. The world doesn't revolve around Downtown Seattle, it really doesn't. Gregoire and Chopp understand this fact.

Gentrification is bad. It has made Seattle unaffordable for working class folks to live in. The solution to this is to create set-asides, incentives and public-funded housing to let Seattleites live in Seattle. Not to make the environs of the city as shitty as possible so as to scare rich people away. That won't work, it will just make the city suck more. But why do I care about this stuff anymore? I already gave up on Seattle. I just can't turn away from its seemingly bottomless stupidity and fake-Green posturing anymore than I could stop watching a person I once loved and was helpless to aid as they mutilate themselves.

Mr.X:
Have. You. Ever. Heard. Of. Global. Warming. ????

Dan Savage continues the laughable assertion that the Viaduct "cuts Seattle off from its waterfront."

Walk down First Avenue. Or Western. It is not the Viaduct, but the acres of office buildings and condos that "cut" the city off from its waterfront.

Is the Viaduct noisy? Sure. Is an arty, architectural masterpiece? Hardly.

But it IS a functional, servicable transportation route that serves 110,000 vehicles per day - the same capacity as 405. It is an important alternative to the I-5 corridor and a vital route for traffic from the adjacent port terminals.

I'm not certain what foul fluid is coursing through the craniums of those who believe a tunnel is affordable. Simply triple whatever pie-eyed estimate Mayor Nickels pulls out of a convenient oriface. Nor am I clear how those who advocate the "tear-it-down-and-let-God-sort-it-out" approach think it is even remotely sensible. Those 110,000 vehicles will go somewhere. Port cargo will not be riding the bus. Ballard and Shoreline residents going to Ikea for a futon will not be taking the bus. Families (yes - despite the hopes and prayers of the Mayor and City Council, there are still families in Seattle) who are travelling to the airport will not be on the bus.

The sensible and fiscally responsible approach would be to repair the existing structure. Unfortunately, that is not a politically feasible option.

So it is a rebuild. A rebuild is inevitable. The Speaker of the House favors it. The leader of the Senate favors it. The chair of the House Transportation Commitee favors it. Even the Chair of the House Appropriations Commitee favors it.

It's time the city concentrates on making a rebuilt Viaduct a good, solid transportation route.

99's been there longer than 50 years. It's our leg of the Pacific Coast Highway. There are still lots of little chunks of "old 99" up and down WA and OR. Some of them are pretty interesting roads to drive on.

Regardless of where one comes down on the viaduct, I really wish people would stop saying that it "cuts us off from the waterfront". That doesn't make any sense, and it REALLY doesn't make any sense coming from a monorail supporter, who should be aware of the benefits of grade separation.

The viaduct was in fact built to restore access to the waterfront, and does a decent job of it. If you want to see what "cutting off from" looks like, continue south for a little ways to the part of 99 that rejoins the surface, when it's East Marginal Way South. It's as easy to cross as I-5 is. That's what surface advocates are proposing to put along the waterfront.

Anyone can stroll under the viaduct any time they want and get right to the waterfront, such as it is. Seeing as how the surface option would necessarily kill the ferry dock, the Aquarium, and everything else along the waterfront that depends on visitors who don't live downtown, right on down to the Old Spaghetti House, it's not exactly clear WHY people would be wanting to get across the raging surface highway.

The noise could be mitigated in an afternoon with some asphalt on the joints, which boom when you hit them, every fifty feet or so.

There is a huge difference between not building a freeway and taking one away. The favorite comparison of the surfacers here, San Francisco's Embarcadero, is in fact a textbook example of exactly the kind of horror that Seattle urbanists should be wanting to keep far away from here.

Personally, I don't think you should be allowed to vote unless you can provide proof that you've driven from Aurora to West Seattle or Boeing Field, and back, at least a dozen times, so you have some idea of what you're talking about.

hey Fnarf... could you please explicate what you mean by:

"The favorite comparison of the surfacers here, San Francisco's Embarcadero, is in fact a textbook example of exactly the kind of horror that Seattle urbanists should be wanting to keep far away from here."

I've heard this many times over and fail to understand what folks are talking about. Although, I don't think that area of town is much to crow about, I do think it's a huge improvement over what it was like when the embarcadero was there.

I think the better comparison, however, is the change that has taken place after the demolition of the thru city freeway. People cried doom and gloom over that and not only has it not really had that bad an impact on thru city traffic, but it has really improved the area along it's old route.

So, hey, if any of you know someone who'd be a good person to speak of the Just Say No position on the Tunnel and Viaduct votes, they should contact the new 43rd District Dems chair or Programs Vice-Chair and get on the February program on this ballot measure.

I personally back the Rebuild Viaduct vote, but I'd rather have people given real choices instead of the usual Build Build Build stuff we cram down their throats. Maybe Josh or Dan could forward a few names/contacts to Hillary?

oh, sorry, links at www.43rddems.org for this ...

Gnossos: what I mean is this: million-mile wide windblown voids are not Euro-style boulevards, no matter now many shoddy condo buildings you erect along them. The goal isn't "not quite as bad as the freeway" but something that can be a part of a vibrant city. No one alive knows how to do that. It's a lost art, and when it was being practiced in the vibrant cities of the world, the people doing it were not trying to do it; they were just trying to make a buck or get to work. Embarcadero achieves nothing. Surface street along the viaduct route achieves nothing. It will be a windswept void that attracts shoddy condos but nothing else.

Yeah, I'm excited too.

For those who would compare the Pike Place Market fight with the Viaduct issue: Keep in mind that those fighting for the Pike Place Market were fighting AGAINST exactly what the Viaduct is: horrifically awful development. In the '60s, the shopping mall was starting to proliferate and suddenly the Pike Place Market seemed like a dirty, old-fashioned slum of a place. The Establishment (Seattle Times, City Council, Mayor, Business community, etc) wanted to tear it all down and put up a 300-car parking garage, a strip mall and a condos. Thankfully, the people rose up and rejected it and now the Pike Place Market has 9 million visitors a year, both locals and tourists, and continues to be one of the best farmers markets in the country.

Peter doesn't want a freeway on the waterfront; retrofit, elevated, or otherwise. It's bad development.

Fnarf, how are you going to vote?

Unlike many of you, I was around during the fight to save the Pike Place Market.

The same arguments that people made against saving the Market are exactly the same arguments that are made for tearing down the Viaduct: It's ugly,
it's in the way, it's a relic of the past.

The argument for tearing the Viaduct down will always be, for me, classist and elitist. There is no thought whatever for people whose time will be displaced, and never recovered, as a result of any teardown.

The Viaduct is like the Market and should be rebuilt for exactly the same reason that we fought to save the Market: Working people use it.

The Viaduct works, just as the Market worked. There's no reason at all to settle for less capacity. When people are willing to abandon their cars voluntarily and all live in the greenies' paradise, it will happen -- but not before.

One more clue for anybody who hopes to be taken seriously when discussing this issue: Please lose the word "vibrant."

Dan, before you say "the viaduct—a mistake we would not make today, and that no one would propose constructing today if our waterfront were viaduct-free" you better think about that. I think that if it weren't there, and all things being equal, people might exactly demand that partly because you do have access to the waterfront. Puh-huh-huh-huh-leeeze don't assume that it wouldn't be an option or say it would never happen. It did for *some* reason back in the 1950's. It was considered the best thing to do at the time. They certainly didn't think it was a mistake.

@12: Fnarf- hear, hear.

@13: I agree the Embarcadero teardown was a good idea. It was simply a spur freeway. And it's not comparable to what we have here in Seattle before or after the teardown. The traffic has probably improved because many that used that as a through route don't anymore. Luckily San Francisco has many through routes through the city (although a couple of significant choke points, to be sure at the bridges). We don't have that in Seattle and the Stranger and surface people don't get that.

The only real compromise is to
build a cable stayed bridge into
Elliott Bay as a replacement
for the Viaduct.

At that point, you won't need
a boulevard; you can build all the shoddy condos Steinbrueck is willing to permit; Seattle can "reconnect"
itself to Ivar's fish bar and the Viaduct can be dismantled.

Here's what Victor Steinbrueck actually said about structures like the Viaduct:

"Streets that ought to be boulevards and were apparently originally so intended, such as Rainier Avenue South and Aurora Avenue, while affording glimpses of scenic splendors, are all the more outrageous, as eyesores typical of less glamorously endowed American cities, because they violate Seattle's very nature as a place of amenity."

from:

Seattle Cityscape #2, University Press, 1973, Victor Steinbrueck (1911-1985)

airfoil, exactly how many of the daily cars on the viaduct are Ballard/Shoreline residents going to Ikea or families driving to the airport? I await your answer.

Personally, I don't think you should be allowed to vote unless you can provide proof that you've driven from Aurora to West Seattle or Boeing Field, and back, at least a dozen times, so you have some idea of what you're talking about.

So those of us who choose not to drive should not be allowed to have a say on this matter? Granted, I have been driven on the viaduct, and while I admit it was convenient, it wasn't 3 billion dollars or continued blight convenient.

There is no thought whatever for people whose time will be displaced, and never recovered, as a result of any teardown.

What about the money you steal from your fellow citizens (and the time it took them to earn it) to make your commute easier? Maybe you should change your commute first, before stealing from the citizens of the city and state. Also, I don't imagine the Viaduct, in 40 years, will draw millions of tourists.

You know what working people do? Take the bus. Transit is a class issue and that's why we need more transit. When I rode the #7, I'm rode it with people who took it work everyday, with young students who took it to class everyday and with others who worked for a living. I took it to work everyday. (Now I take a different bus to work.)

Also taking the bus: People of color, to use a sloppy, catch-all term for non-white people. The #7, the #36, the #48...it goes on.

Also taking the bus: Poor people who cannot afford cars. Every week, I see Moms with their little babies on the bus. You bet they would love a nice car with a car seat, but instead they are holding their babies on their laps in the morning.

This is why we need to improve transit. Rebuilding it isn't a working class solution, it's a fat-cat megaproject for contractors and labor and all the other mega-project lovers to make money on. They have fooled us all into thinking it's a "working man's" solution. That couldn't be further from the truth.

No one wants to talk about transit because it's not a mega-project. People feel the need to "do something" and "doing something" is a mega-project, apparently. Spend the money on transit so *everyone* can get to where they need to go.

The same arguments that people made against saving the Market are exactly the same arguments that are made for tearing down the Viaduct: It's ugly,
it's in the way, it's a relic of the past.

The argument for tearing the Viaduct down will always be, for me, classist and elitist. There is no thought whatever for people whose time will be displaced, and never recovered, as a result of any teardown.

That's why I'm also against gay marriage, blacks in schools, women voting, women having jobs, the abolition of slavery, the end of the cold war, and the end of the Iraq war.

Nobody is arguing that the viaduct should be torn down because it's a "relic of the past." They're arguing it should be torn down because it SUCKS.

I don't care if "working people use it." Working people used to use asbestos and lead paints and beat their wives to blow off some steam. Times change and people realize that people in the past made horrible mistakes.

That comment was horribly formatted, but the basic arguments follow:

Viaduct pros
* Slight convenience for some drivers who live in West Seattle or Ballard starting in 2015 or so

Viaduct cons
* Increased pollution
* Increased traffic
* Enormous cost
* Uglification of the city
* Use of some of the most valuable real estate north of California and west of Chicago

You have to have some messed up values to think that the pros outweigh the cons.

@24,

Absolutely.

@19,

The Market is not used by working people. It draws tourists and upper class foodies. Working people shop at Safeway.

Working @ 24:

I agree with much of what you say. If we had the transit in place that would fill the gap that removing the Viaduct would create, that would be another story.

But we don't. And so we won't.

Jamier @ 25:

Nice little social engineer, aren't you?

Jamier @ 26:

What will cars that use a tunnel emit? Green chlorophyll perfume? I grovel in mortification that my values do not meet your lofty standards.

#28: Yes, and if we sink all of our limited funds into a freeway, we never will. This idea of "let's building a freeway first 'cause that's a "basic" THEN improve transit" is completely off-base. (In my opinion, of course.)

Freeways are FANCY. They're expensive. They are always sold to cities as an economic lifesaver when they just rob communities of their taxpayer money that should be spent elsewhere to improve people's lives.

We know the Viaduct is a super-fast way to get around for people with cars and even the bus. It's hardly ever clogged. That's why everyone loves it. (Those who don't live or work near it, that is.) However, rebuilding it is a mistake. We should spend the money on transit instead so everyone can get around.

There is BRT funded from West Seattle and Northgate to downtown, but no one cares. They claim we don't have the money to make it work and that buses are slow and smelly. BS. We have the money for a fancy freeway, but not rapid transit?

"We have the money for a fancy freeway, but not rapid transit?"

Where the $2+ billion in gas taxes earmarked for the AWV is concerned, that is in fact the reality - you CAN'T use those dollars for transit.

And Grant, people will still be using roads for the next 100 or more years - but probably not in vehicles powered by petroleum-based fuels in internal combustion engines (I am still holding out for my flying car ala The Fifth Element, however).

Thanks to "working" for exposing the phony populism in these claims by ivan and others that rebuilding the viaduct is what "real" people want. As if cynical resignation to unimaginative, status quo outcomes is a proud part of the populist or labor tradition. Defending a multi-billion highway on behalf of lower-income people is pathetic. A true advocate for affordability questions the assumption that we should continue taxing people for auto capacity when less expensive alternatives abound -- as proposed by advocates of the surface and transit solution. One does not become an apologist for the rebuild option just because it satisfies an urge to get a poke in at the mayor, wrongheaded as the tunnel proposal may be. Is the tunnel a concoction of the downtown elite? Yes. Is this the issue that taxpayers should be most concerned about? No. Any self-styled "working" person should call on our leaders to stop the unaffordable and expoitative expansion of highways and invest in the systems that deliver true public benefits, in which we should include reduced air and water pollution. If rebuild supporters don't believe transit systems will work, that's one thing. If they just prefer to haul themselves around in their cars, they should say so. But adopting the mantle of the people's hero or the "voice of common sense" is ridiculous. Highways are not victories for the commoweal. They cost all of us dearly.

Horsepucky, Volver. When the election results are available, you'll be able to see just which parts of the City supported which option, and you'll be proved throughly wrong.

My guess is that you don't hang out with the plebes much, do you?

X, yes, roads will always be around, and cars of some kind will always be around unless we go back to the horsecart. Even in the distant future when private autos are non-polluting, the amount of energy, time and money required to build them (and the waste of those things in a sprawl-based lifestyle) will still be ridiculous when compared to a transit/pedestrian culture which helps facilitate folks who are not carrying a toolbox or a load of vegetables or windows to get around all by their lonesome bodily selves. Not addressing global warming while waiting for that day to come is the kind of 'technology will save us' faith that almost everyone stopped counting on decades ago. Why not instead build communities in the meantime that honor space and human beings living like human beings (rather than as drivers, or consumers) and help care for the natural environment?

And Ivan (19) what ARE you smoking? Because I want some, it would make the madness of where I am now (L.A.) seem right pleasant. It is only by your affluent American postwar suburban standards that drivers are the proletariat: people who are really struggling- REALLY struggling - can't afford a car. The Market was worth saving because it was a space which still, in the tradition of urban spaces up to the 1950s, was... there's no better word - civilized. It wasn't worth saving just because it worked in some outdated and impermanent way (like the Viaduct) but because it was BEAUTIFUL. And the Viaduct, in its own way, hooked up to the nightmare of Cold War 70 MPH unlimited suburban 'freedom', is kind of beautiful too, as-is. Because it is a relic of a dying way of life, one that should die, but there is tragedy in the deaths of villains too. When people are dying, when they are in pain and their bodies are worn out and every day is costing their survivors money that could be spent on health and life and futurity, they tell their doctors not to use 'heroic measures' to bring them back if they die. Let's be like that now.