I'm with you. Chopp should own this decision forever. Nick Licata should at least get the Seneca off ramp named after him as well.

How about the "Carrie Moon, 'My way or the Highway' arial expressway".

Thanks to everyone who opposed the better Tunnel option.

How about the God Damn “The Stranger’s Silence is Golden” NASCAR Track in Kitsap that is being supported by King and Snohomish county legislators?

For the record (and I heard this from the Honorable Mr. Chopp personally last weekend), he does not and never did support the ordinary elevated rebuild, and he _is_ open to the surface/transit option.

In fact, _especially_ given that the state is supplying 95-99% of the money for the project, he's the single most powerful individual who has both publicly stated that he's open to the surface/transit option and is in a position to directly affect the outcome.

So, we need to make sure that he blocks an ordinary elevated rebuild and gets surface/transit an honest look.

No tunnel proposal was a great idea between the combination of cost and environmental impacts. It is shortsighted to throw up our hands and say "Seattle is just a car-dependent place," then spend billions of new dollars reinforcing that idea.

And NASCAR sucks.

How about the Mayor Gridlock Failure of Leadership Highway?

I think it should be called "The Seattle Way."

I know NASCAR sucks. Tell your legislators to NOT SPEND YOUR TAXES ON A DAMN NASCAR TRACK here!

The script from the beginning was pay the bill for the tunnel or the state will rebuild.

What is all the hysteria about.......get some life in reality all you trust fund kids.

Oh, I know, we need the monorail. Why didn't the cool people on the board, many friends of the Stranger do their jobs?

Chopp is hard to figure -- he doesn't seem to have ever been "pro" anything, just anti-tunnel. Since the tunnel is apparently no longer going to be around for him to kick at, his ire might turn to the monstrosity next... add in all the ex-govs's, Sims, and the fact that the council and Mayor are never going to endorse the re-build and you might just have a perfect storm forming in support of surface -- or at least the Steinbreuck (sp?) band-aid...

Days like this make me wonder why TF I gave money to Gregoire's recount effort -- what ever happened to all that money anyway, didn't they get it back from the state in the end?

NASCAR does suck...

But someone needs to change the radio station...this song is getting old..

I think Seattle's new motto should be: "We're trying really hard to suck as much as L.A.!"

Don't be defeatist, now, folks. The tunnel is dead but that does NOT mean that surface-transit is out! Check out this quote from Lisa Brown:

Brown said the only option on the table now, that's been fully vetted, is the proposal for an elevated highway. However, she said the idea of tearing down the viaduct and going with a surface option hasn't been ruled out. "I don't think the door has been completely closed," she said.

Speaker Chopp has also indicated his willingness to study surface-transit. We must demand that WSDOT conduct a fuller study of surface-transit. I believe that Mayor Nickels and the City Council will now make surface-transit their first choice.

Let’s name it the Greg Nickels Memorial Viaduct. It was his monumental arrogance and tactical incompetence which brought us to this point. Two of his miscalculations proved fatal:

First of all, from the beginning he accepted the state’s position that capacity must be maintained. He could have argued for 70,000, or 80,000, or some figure that could later be bargained down, which would have opened up the door for other solutions. He thought he was smarter than Joel Horn, he thought *his* project would never have funding problems or rising costs. Didn’t he learn anything from being Finance Chair of Sound Transit when it all went wrong?

Secondly, when he was backed into a corner, and needed to bargain, he chose to go on the attack. The State can smash the City—any city—like a bug whenever it wants to. This mandates a need to negotiate and bargain, not repeatedly say “screw you” to someone who holds all the aces when all you have is a pair of twos. His bluster was a bluff begging to be called.

Chopp opposes the tunnel, and it’s dead now. Don’t waste your time hating on him—it just makes you look like a Nickels lackey—talk to him. Do what the Nickels should have done years ago, argue the need for transit as a better solution to long-term needs than a rebuild, argue the $2.8 billion is better spent there.

That’s what San Francisco did with California in the 70’s, and why the cross-downtown freeway from the Bay Bridge to the Golden Gate Bridge never got build. San Francisco won by convincing the state. But here in Seattle, we’re so high and mighty that we can’t even be bothered to talk to Olympia, we simply assume that because of our inherent moral superiority, everyone should just follow our dictates.

Frank is a sitting rep. He's not eligible. But Norm Rice (for the city futzing around) or Gary Locke (for putting off hard decisions) are eligible to have a bridge or other significant landmark named after them. I figure, if it's a tunnel, we name it after Norm - if a viaduct, we name it after Gary.

It's really the Erica Barnett et al Viaduct.

per David, above

Biff @12: Let’s name it the Greg Nickels Memorial Viaduct. It was his monumental arrogance and tactical incompetence which brought us to this point. Two of his miscalculations proved fatal:...

Well said. The whole post.

This is a puzzle, really. All the loudmouths who nixed the tunnel, now blame Nickels?

After working for over two years against his plan, all goes sour and it is his fault......

Oh, I know. It is his fat belly that brought us down.

Gee, how yellow belly and crassona can you get.

Were most of you folks on the monorail board which could not ask hard questions of its well paid and numerous staff for three years?

Such quality leaders.

The Mayor put out a plan, the State said pay for it, he can't.

What's the fuck? He tried.

You were not listening when Chopp, Sommers and many others said about a year ago they had doubts about any solution but the rebuild.

Open your ears to the power brokers of the Legislature next time.

Especially when it is STATE OF WASHINGTON issue.

tsk, caleb, typical, blaming others for your own waffling. let me guess, you think we should study it for another 20 years, right?

No, Will. I liked the tunnel, but when Greg kept blowing farts instead of gathering the cash, I assumed the state would assert its power to rebuild.

I have depicted the exact scenerio that is unfolding to friends for over a year.

I've said it before and I'll say it again, it's got to be the Matlock Viaduct.

Ghettoduct II: Drive HARDER

Has no one in Washington-state politics been to the embarcadero here in san francisco? When the loma prieta damaged 480, it was removed with no replacement and the city has become more beauitful than it had ever been