Thank gawd a viaduct slog - cancel the methadone!

I understand why Licata wants to cancel the election, because he wants the rebuild. But Steinbrueck? I don't get it. Doesn't the rebuild resistance have to start with its defeat at the ballot box? Can someone clue me in here?

1. Steinbrueck thinks this whole vote is a joke.

2. Most polling shows that the rebuild will win. If it does and by some margin, it makes it more difficult to move away from a rebuild. Better not to have a result and keep pushing against the rebuild.

I'm afraid that what will happen is that the dueling ballot items will cause some voters to think they should choose one or the other. So, rather a no/no there will be a yes/no or a no/yes. Repair doesn't stand a chance with either of the latter two.

Seattle's a great city, but the political climate here really makes me want to move. Why can't we get any shit done around here? First we vote a thousand times on the monorail. Finally we get going on it and we give up. Now we're voting for the sport of it.

@4: Repair doesn't stand a chance, period.

I suggest voting for MONORAIL as a write-in.

#5: I think the main problem is using the ballot box to avoid making decisions.

I agree that this situation makes me realize how not progressive Seattle is.

@7 -

Dude, you got your self-masturbatory post yesterday - will you finally leave these comment threads alone?

Dude I read The Stranger. I can comment. I didn't even mention my issue.

Also Willis. I am a PCO you should be sucking up to me come caucus time.

for those nostalgic of a can-do time, set the DVR:

Subject: AMERICAN EXPERIENCE Visits NEW YORK UNDERGROUND

News from American Experience
http://www.pbs.org/amex

AMERICAN EXPERIENCE Visits NEW YORK UNDERGROUND Monday, February 19 at 9 p.m. on PBS (check local listings)

Winter weather can snarl a commute. Never was that more apparent than in March of 1888, when a ferocious blizzard ground New York City to a halt. Mountains of snow twenty feet high filled the streets. Horse-drawn streetcars and omnibuses lay abandoned. The entire city was paralyzed. The snow left no doubt that New York needed an underground rail system and in 1894, after years of political obstacles, a plan was approved. Construction began in 1900.

The scale of the subway's construction was unprecedented. At least 7,700 men constructed the ambitious twenty-one-mile route, excavating and building the system virtually by hand. Workers had to tunnel through mountains of earth, ford underground streams and patches of quicksand, even skirt building foundations.

Finally, on October 27, 1904, the Interborough Rapid Transit -- IRT -- opened to the public. The subway was so successful in reducing street level traffic and redistributing the population that just three years later, plans to expand it were begun. Over the next three decades, construction continued at full pace, and has never completely stopped.

AMERICAN EXPERIENCE reprises NEW YORK UNDERGROUND on Monday, February 19.

As we consider options for the viaduct, we as taxpayers need to be asking two questions:

1. What will be the total cost to us -- through local and Federal taxes, tolls, and indirect costs -- over the life of the structure? and,
2. Who will be the recipients of the money -- multinational contractors, financial services companies, state and local bureaucrats?

We must hold our elected representatives, and the state and local public servants who work for us, accountable for providing this information. Personally, until I see reasonably accurate budget estimates covering the above, I cannot support any of the proposals now being discussed.

": Repair doesn't stand a chance, period."

Yes it does, comma. So there!

We are doing repair and have been for six years. Minimal but we have been doing patch up repairs. What we aren't doing is building the transit and other enhancements we should be doing regardless of the viaduct's future.

The state will not approve the tunnel and Seattle will not build another viaduct. The state will not tear down the viaduct and risk being blamed for the traffic congestion in the future. Repair is not designed to last forever but to buy time to address the issue and come to more of a consensus than we now have.

What exactly do you mean by "repair"?

Patch up the above ground structure? What about the foundation?

Last I checked, the only credible and fleshed out "retrofit" or repair plan had a price tag around $2 billion and involved highly experimental techniques for the foundation. Are you thinking of something else?

By the way, everything's on the table...this project will still be in limbo for another 10 years.

Yeah, but that proposal was also gerrymandered to keep the AWV usable after a 500-year event, as that criteria would cast retrofit in the worst possible light. Reduce that to keeping it from catastrophically failing, and you've got a much more affordable proposition.

Heck, if it shifts another inch or so, WSDOT has already said it will cost "millions" to do the necessary repairs. Given the amount of traffic the AWV carries, that sounds like a bargain to me.

Peter @ 3 --
What "most polling"? The only public info around is from results released back in October and my half-assed attempt to survey. Google search: viaduct poll seattle

I'm looking but I ain't finding.

BTW, my half-assed attempt had about 200 respondents and Measure 2 (the rebuild measure) got crushed.

The rebuild is going to be rejected. The only question is if people will vote No/No out of anger or decide to fark with Gov. G and choose the tunnel as the lesser of two evils.

Um, how about this Jan 17 2007 poll that came out before WSDOT and Gregoire took a great big dump on the tunnel -

http://www.surveyusa.com/client/PollReport.aspx?g=38941499-c095-401b-952e-0ff38912f79c

Don't quit your day job hoping for a gig at Elway just yet, big guy....

If the end result is a rebuild I predict Gregoire will be a single term governor. People that want the rebuild will not change their minds about her but those that want any of the other options are going to be most upset. She is not exactly riding a wave of popularity as it is.

And regardless of the pros/cons, and I can see both sides, Seattle and WA will look ridiculous for rebuilding. So much for the city's green credentials.

The vote is a joke, but it's an opportunity to vote NO on the rebuild. People can vote YES or NO for the tunnel but it's not going to happen so it doesn't matter either way.

That leaves repair as the only short-term option. In the long-term, the viaduct has to come down. So we might as well start preparing for that by getting Sound Transit to include West Seattle and Ballard spur lines from the downtown light rail, and doing all the surface modifications we can to reduce traffic when the viaduct eventually comes down. The more we do to mitigate now, the more pleasant and pedestrian-friendly the Alaskan Way boulevard we'll get to build.

Well, I bet all of those folks who are so adamantly opposed to a rebuild are just gonna LOVE having a Republican governor if they decide to oppose Gregoire.

Talk about cutting off your nose to spite your face...

Mr. X, your posted survey left off, oh, a couple of options.

They aren't on the ballot though, are they? You don't get to check a box marked "other" in elections, and write-in's are futile 99.99% of the time.

No and no. Those are the two options unavailable on the poll that are on the ballot.

Don't there are write ins for non-office votes.

The repair report included foundation work on sections that are not damaged and were more to 2500 year standards although they still it wouldn't last as long as a rebuild.

The $2.3B number is deceptive in that it includes all the other work - seawall, transit, 519 etc. - but even at that number it saves $500M and allows us to prepare for its removal while keeping capacity in the meantime. Victor Gray's group believes that it could save even more.

The Times had an earlier poll that had rebuild at 50% and the tunnel at 25%. On the USASurvey when told that the Mayor supported the tunnel the number went up for the tunnel 2% to about 30% if I remember correctly.

As of 2/12 the pro tunnel group had about $30,000 total from the first of the year less what they have spent.

Given that it's all a joke, I'm with 8bit Jake on the MONORAIL write-in; that made me laugh.

@10 -

OH MY GOD! YOU'RE A PCO JAKE?!? REALLY?

I am a PCO also, but I'm still not sure what you're line about sucking up for the caucus season means - caucuses are open to anyone who is willing to declare themselves a Democrat and show up bright and early on a Saturday morning.

All that said, none of my legislators are signed on to the NASCAR legislation, and I am personally against it also (but I'm still not sure if it really qualifies as something that anyone in Seattle really personally cares about (unless you take the SEIU position of being against all public funding for sports stadiums, etc).

Peace out Jake,

-Willis

Measure 912 was polling 61-39 for and ended up losing by the same maring. Trouble is there's not enough time to get the message out before the vote. anti-912 campaign was well organized an did a great job.

That said, I see the Yes on rebuild at less than 50% but greater than 40%

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