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News & ArtsTuesday, July 20, 2010
City / Science My Problem with the Tunnel
Posted by Jonathan Golob on Tue, Jul 20, 2010 at 6:30 AM
My real problem with the tunnel is the outcome if everything goes exactly to plan. The huge risk (financial, civic and environmental) being forced onto the city—and the nasty, triangulating political calculation behind it—are assuredly there, as crisply laid out by Dom. The tunnel's risks are likely to be huge; most pertinently, we're expected to accept these risk before they are even defined.
What if it succeeds? The tunnel is a fifty year (at least) investment. The sheer magnitude of the project (as planned, before any potential cost overruns) establishes it as the centerpiece of our transportation vision—a doubling down on single-occupancy car commuters. This is a transportation system focused on petroleum, cars, trucks, suburban commuters—epitomized by a tunnel that bypasses the urban core of our region, whisking its users right through the city like it isn't even there.
As we're learning, maintaining the petroleum economy isn't so easy. WIth maximum efforts, maximum opening of potential deposits to exploitation, acceptance of maximal environmental risk (both potential and actual), we can expect global oil reserves to last approximately sixty more years. The fighting over the last few drops is likely to be vicious. What will follow—what could take the place the energy-dense hydrocarbon fuels we enjoy now—isn't clear. In the fifty year lifespan of this tunnel, we can expect the cars it's being built for to run out of fuel. It's a dead end.
The problem is moving people and freight—not creating capacity for cars. From that perspective, our investment into the nascent light rail network (another fifty year investment) is prescient. The light rail system does not depend upon petroleum to move people; nor does it depend upon some miraculous, dubious from the limits of physics, leap forward in battery technology. The tunnel would make more sense if its goal was—instead of moving cars from Kent to Shoreline—to move freight from the port via heavy rail out from the city core unmolested. (The tunnel-is-pro-freight argument for the tunnel has always seemed particularly obtuse to me. Rail is vastly more efficient that diesel-fueled trucks. Rail will exist in 100 years. Diesel trucks, we should hope not.)
Tearing down the Viaduct through downtown—replacing it with a surface street and no tunnel—would help the entire region make a gentler transition to the post-petroleum world we're heading towards. Patterns of land development will adjust slowly over time. We're sealing our fate (one way, or the other) by this choice.
3
Thank you. In the babble about cost overruns and the egos on the council, this has been drowned out. This is by far the best argument for not moving ahead. I wish O'Brien and McGinn would speak more to this - it's a good argument that resonates, and people are really sick of the cost overrun argument. Even if that's resolved, this is still a god-awful plan.
4
Isn't the structure behind the argument for "making a transition to the post-petroleum world by reducing the efficiency of our roads" EXACTLY THE SAME as the GOP's failed idea of "starving the beast"? Tell me, how well did cutting taxes to deficit-inducing levels work to "shrink government"?
There are going to be trucks on the road. (Which train would I put produce on to deliver it to the PCC by Greenlake, Golob?) So to confuse making the roads less efficient -- which causes MPG to go down & CO2 emissions per vehicle to skyrocket -- with reducing demand for roads it a logical error of Newt Gingrich-esque proportions!
There are going to be trucks on the road. (Which train would I put produce on to deliver it to the PCC by Greenlake, Golob?) So to confuse making the roads less efficient -- which causes MPG to go down & CO2 emissions per vehicle to skyrocket -- with reducing demand for roads it a logical error of Newt Gingrich-esque proportions!
5
@4 Fossil fuels are finite, so no, it's not 'exactly the same'. The fuels run out. Although 2 makes a good point, that tech isn't exactly here yet. I guess if you invest in the tunnel, you better hope it will be in 50 years.
6
My problem with the viaduct replacement is that it's such a posturing opportunity. Everyone's got a claim of comprehensiveness for a litany of cherrypicked facts. Everyone's either with us or against us. Everyone justifies their cruelties and knifework by gesturing a little too broadly toward the noble ends their betters elsewhere have achieved.
Everyone seems to think this bloodbath is going to be worth it.
Everyone seems to think this bloodbath is going to be worth it.
7
@5 I think the tech is a lot closer than people think. We could have at least 50% of our transportation energy use on electric in a decade if we really put our minds and money to it. I know that most trips I take could easily be done on electric with current technologies. You throw a nice subsidy my way and I'll buy an electric(or plug in hybrid) car tomorrow.
And the fossil fuels last a lot longer if you count coal and natural gas. Sadly I don't think running out of them is going to get us to change in time to avoid some severe climate change.
And the fossil fuels last a lot longer if you count coal and natural gas. Sadly I don't think running out of them is going to get us to change in time to avoid some severe climate change.
8
Let's say the viaduct does get built. Then, let's say that a quarter-century from now, commuting patterns change and transit gets better and the city center gets denser and denser, and the tunnel seems even less necessary then than it does now. But instead of closing off the tunnel, we tear up I-5 through downtown, and make the necessary connections to 99. Voila, 32 city blocks (the space I-5 takes up from Dearborn to Mercer) that have been salvaged and are available for condos or parks or Museums of Glass or whatever.
(I'm not arguing that the tunnel is a good idea. But if it were to get built, this is the rosiest, happiest, most optimistic outcome I could imagine.)
(I'm not arguing that the tunnel is a good idea. But if it were to get built, this is the rosiest, happiest, most optimistic outcome I could imagine.)
10
Apparently Dom hasn't noticed the train tunnel and light rail tunnel that already run through downtown.
Of course most freight should move by rail. And it does. But some also moves by truck. Always has, even when the trucks were pulled by horses. The question is whether we want all that truck traffic on our city streets or on a grade-separated arterial.
Do you seriously think downtown will be a nicer place if every motorized vehicle traveling through Seattle is forced onto two lanes of I-5 underneath the Convention Center?
And for those who discount access to the waterfront, you must have forgotten the concerts on the pier, before the city shut them down. And you must be blind to the enjoyment people derive from the waterfront access at the Olympic Sculpture Park, South Lake Union Park, and any number of urban waterfront parks in the city. Can you imagine Alki with 40,000 cars and trucks moving along it each day?
Plus, even if cars and trucks become obsolete, I doubt that a transportation tunnel through downtown Seattle will be of any less use or value. The Burke-Gilman railroad became obsolete, but the last time I checked, the right of way was being used in a very productive manner.
Of course most freight should move by rail. And it does. But some also moves by truck. Always has, even when the trucks were pulled by horses. The question is whether we want all that truck traffic on our city streets or on a grade-separated arterial.
Do you seriously think downtown will be a nicer place if every motorized vehicle traveling through Seattle is forced onto two lanes of I-5 underneath the Convention Center?
And for those who discount access to the waterfront, you must have forgotten the concerts on the pier, before the city shut them down. And you must be blind to the enjoyment people derive from the waterfront access at the Olympic Sculpture Park, South Lake Union Park, and any number of urban waterfront parks in the city. Can you imagine Alki with 40,000 cars and trucks moving along it each day?
Plus, even if cars and trucks become obsolete, I doubt that a transportation tunnel through downtown Seattle will be of any less use or value. The Burke-Gilman railroad became obsolete, but the last time I checked, the right of way was being used in a very productive manner.
11
BTW, couldn't you write the exact same column about just tearing down the 520 bridge and not replacing it? And why all the tears shed for the South Park bridge? Wasn't it just a fossil fuel-consuming dinosaur carrier? Good riddance!
12
Isn't this the same argument against eliminating the bottlenecks on 520 (aka, widening the bridge)? You know: fuck the commuters, they'll just suffer for 5-10 years while we build the infrastructure it will take to get them there.
This actually puts a better spin on the tunnel, actually. The light rail only goes to downtown, then will veer off to the other side of I-5. The tunnel will prevent people from getting off during the downtown commute, encouraging people to park their car and take light rail to nearby stops, while allowing people to easily pass through and make their way to non-light rail destinations.
Thanks Golob for bringing a pro-tunnel, pro-light rail spin on things.
This actually puts a better spin on the tunnel, actually. The light rail only goes to downtown, then will veer off to the other side of I-5. The tunnel will prevent people from getting off during the downtown commute, encouraging people to park their car and take light rail to nearby stops, while allowing people to easily pass through and make their way to non-light rail destinations.
Thanks Golob for bringing a pro-tunnel, pro-light rail spin on things.
13
@2 is right.
Beyond that, I have yet to understand the hypnotism that putting all of the traffic from the viaduct onto waterfront street level will result in an aesthetically pleasant future, particularly for pedestrians.
Beyond that, I have yet to understand the hypnotism that putting all of the traffic from the viaduct onto waterfront street level will result in an aesthetically pleasant future, particularly for pedestrians.
14
One fallacy here is that the tunnel project will create 'capacity' for cars. It really does not, based on a review of the traffic projections for that area of Seattle.
The tunnel itself has less carrying capacity than the existing viaduct, but survives by offloading DT based traffic onto improved city streets. And even considering the sum of the improvements, it does not represent a net gain in performance levels for the corridor.
So, Mr. Golob, in a way the existing proposal does indeed accomplish what you are advocating: it assumes transit investment to improve people mobility.
And frankly, transferring the existing 110,000 daily vehicle trips onto surface streets ultimately creates a different problem - that the WSDOT engineers will design a solution for it. Much like way 520 and Montlake Blvd cut the Montlake neighborhood in half, the surface street option really isn't much more palatable. The section of Montlake Blvd between 520 and the University bridge is a good example - it sucks as a pedestrian experience and only handles about 60,000 vehicle trips per day at an abysmal service level. The existing traffic load on the viaduct and Alaskan Way is nearly three times that. The surface street option is cheap, but akin to Lakeshore Drive in Chicago in some ways, it cuts huge portions of the city off from the waterfront (and carries ~130,000 AADT over the Chicago River).
The tunnel itself has less carrying capacity than the existing viaduct, but survives by offloading DT based traffic onto improved city streets. And even considering the sum of the improvements, it does not represent a net gain in performance levels for the corridor.
So, Mr. Golob, in a way the existing proposal does indeed accomplish what you are advocating: it assumes transit investment to improve people mobility.
And frankly, transferring the existing 110,000 daily vehicle trips onto surface streets ultimately creates a different problem - that the WSDOT engineers will design a solution for it. Much like way 520 and Montlake Blvd cut the Montlake neighborhood in half, the surface street option really isn't much more palatable. The section of Montlake Blvd between 520 and the University bridge is a good example - it sucks as a pedestrian experience and only handles about 60,000 vehicle trips per day at an abysmal service level. The existing traffic load on the viaduct and Alaskan Way is nearly three times that. The surface street option is cheap, but akin to Lakeshore Drive in Chicago in some ways, it cuts huge portions of the city off from the waterfront (and carries ~130,000 AADT over the Chicago River).
15
<3 Golob for lines like this:
"...our investment into the nascent light rail network (another fifty year investment) is prescient."
And yes. Tunnel bad.
"...our investment into the nascent light rail network (another fifty year investment) is prescient."
And yes. Tunnel bad.
16
So you want to maintain freight capacity but tear down the viaduct and let the trucks travel on surface streets? Conflicted much?
17
So if electric cars would be the next source of individual mobility, where does that electricity come from? Nearly 30% of the energy consumed in the US is by the "transportation" sector, and approximately 60% of that consumption is by personnel vehicles. As petroleum goes offline as our primary transportation energy source, where is the power to fill the electric cars going to come from?
19
If it is built we'll have no real roads or transit budget until at least 2020 - everything will be sacrificed to the Billionaires Tunnel.
Fracking vanity project.
Fracking vanity project.
20
@14: You do recognize that this fantasy solution offered by the tunnel does just as much -- if not more -- harm to the waterfront as the surface solution? It puts more freight, more cars and more traffic on the waterfront, all with the added weight of being completely unable to finance future adjustments in traffic and transit, thanks to a delightful depletion of relevant monies.
A well-managed surface solution is considerably more agreeable and far more in tune with building a less car-dependent puget sound.
@16: Limited functional weight allowed on the viaduct, absolutely NO freight in the tunnel with no access to the main freight destinations? Looks like the present and fantasy future are pretty much opposed to your idea of how freight currently functions with the viaduct.
That said, I'm tired of the Tunnel Everywhere Already obstructionists. Reducing lane miles and curtailing huge road projects is a progressive stance in a green city like Seattle. Opposing a progressive stance, calling for an ouster of any anti-tunnel politico, predicting dire consequences, predicting the death of jobs? Paging Glenn Beck!
I think we should kill two birds with one stone and just take all that tunnel money and build a monorail along the waterfront from West Seattle to Ballard. Hell, if there's extra money, link it with the Seattle Center Monorail and add a couple of stations to it.
A well-managed surface solution is considerably more agreeable and far more in tune with building a less car-dependent puget sound.
@16: Limited functional weight allowed on the viaduct, absolutely NO freight in the tunnel with no access to the main freight destinations? Looks like the present and fantasy future are pretty much opposed to your idea of how freight currently functions with the viaduct.
That said, I'm tired of the Tunnel Everywhere Already obstructionists. Reducing lane miles and curtailing huge road projects is a progressive stance in a green city like Seattle. Opposing a progressive stance, calling for an ouster of any anti-tunnel politico, predicting dire consequences, predicting the death of jobs? Paging Glenn Beck!
I think we should kill two birds with one stone and just take all that tunnel money and build a monorail along the waterfront from West Seattle to Ballard. Hell, if there's extra money, link it with the Seattle Center Monorail and add a couple of stations to it.
21
Will, the state alone pulls in near a billion a year in gas tax money. The tunnel is about 2 billion. It would have to have overruns like no project before in order to do what you say. You are, as usual, full of shit.
22
The GOP's "starving the beast" analogy is apt in the sense that it worked. They successfully shifted the center of the debate over taxes so far to the right that proposals to merely return to the tax structure of the 1990s raise howls of "socialism" and spark talk of violent revolution.
It would be a huge boon to mankind if letting a little bit of car-centric infrastructure fade away would cause a similar seismic shift in thinking.
***
One missing pice here, besides rail and rapid transit, is density. By building everything closer together, the need to move all those people and things decreases and solutions to moving them those shorter distances become both simpler and cheaper.
It would be a huge boon to mankind if letting a little bit of car-centric infrastructure fade away would cause a similar seismic shift in thinking.
***
One missing pice here, besides rail and rapid transit, is density. By building everything closer together, the need to move all those people and things decreases and solutions to moving them those shorter distances become both simpler and cheaper.
23
#17: "where is the power to fill the electric cars going to come from?"
We live in the NW. We have nice clean hydro power. We're working on getting more wind turbines in place as well as some solar out in Eastern WA. The filthy coal boogeyman doesn't dance too well in these parts.
We live in the NW. We have nice clean hydro power. We're working on getting more wind turbines in place as well as some solar out in Eastern WA. The filthy coal boogeyman doesn't dance too well in these parts.
24
@20 - By definition, any solution that removes the viaduct exits into downtown puts more freight onto Alaskan Way than currently exists.
The existing traffic load on Alaskan Way is 11,700 trips per day. The existing load on the viaduct through the waterfront is 110,000 trips per day. The tunnel solution transfers about 40% of that load onto Alaskan Way.
My bone with Dom/Golob here is that the tunnel gets flogged for 'beyond precedent' engineering, while the surface option contains 'beyond precedent' social engineering risks with respect to getting people out of SOVs and onto some form of transit. I'm not arguing for the existing tunnel solution, BTW. I just don't understand what a 'well managed surface solution' is that does not contain signficant risks as well - albeit different ones.
The tunnel is very expensive. But it does not increase overall efficiency in the corridor with respect to SOV trips as Golob's post suggests.
The existing traffic load on Alaskan Way is 11,700 trips per day. The existing load on the viaduct through the waterfront is 110,000 trips per day. The tunnel solution transfers about 40% of that load onto Alaskan Way.
My bone with Dom/Golob here is that the tunnel gets flogged for 'beyond precedent' engineering, while the surface option contains 'beyond precedent' social engineering risks with respect to getting people out of SOVs and onto some form of transit. I'm not arguing for the existing tunnel solution, BTW. I just don't understand what a 'well managed surface solution' is that does not contain signficant risks as well - albeit different ones.
The tunnel is very expensive. But it does not increase overall efficiency in the corridor with respect to SOV trips as Golob's post suggests.
25
my god, this city loves to talk. pity we don't enjoy actually doing anything based on what we talk about.
26
There will always be gasoline to run gasoline vehicles.
At some point the cost-effectiveness of driving less, transit, or going all electric will transition new transportation modes. Still, you can artificially create gasoline from garbage, it just isn't more cost-effective than pulling crude out of the ground right now in 2010. Fixed infrastructure like home heating oil and oil burning electric plants are things designed to last decades, they'll be hurt a lot by the loss of cheap petroleum. Cars last a decade or so, people buy new ones and the new ones will just have a different power source.
The idea that building a tunnel for cars is stupid because cars will be obsolete is based on the non-sequitur that cars will always run on oil. They won't.
Seattle's population also isn't what is growing so fast, Seattle's population has been relatively flat for half a century. Even as Seattle becomes denser, the population booms are going on north and south of us, and that only increases for the next half a century. Those people want to drive straight through our city. The tunnel puts them where we want them - out of sight, out of mind.
At some point the cost-effectiveness of driving less, transit, or going all electric will transition new transportation modes. Still, you can artificially create gasoline from garbage, it just isn't more cost-effective than pulling crude out of the ground right now in 2010. Fixed infrastructure like home heating oil and oil burning electric plants are things designed to last decades, they'll be hurt a lot by the loss of cheap petroleum. Cars last a decade or so, people buy new ones and the new ones will just have a different power source.
The idea that building a tunnel for cars is stupid because cars will be obsolete is based on the non-sequitur that cars will always run on oil. They won't.
Seattle's population also isn't what is growing so fast, Seattle's population has been relatively flat for half a century. Even as Seattle becomes denser, the population booms are going on north and south of us, and that only increases for the next half a century. Those people want to drive straight through our city. The tunnel puts them where we want them - out of sight, out of mind.
27
"There will always be gasoline to run gasoline vehicles" is about as true as saying there will always be whale spermaceti to make candles. But on another level it is true in the sense that at one time many people were incapable of imagining life without a whaling industry.
28
@27, did you read what I said? If we run out of oil from the ground, we can just artificially make gas from other sources. It isn't cost-effective now, but it will be if it comes to Golob's scenario.
29
Yes. Read it. We can make synthetic gas. If we want to.
Just like we make artificial whale oil for our lamps. Oh, wait, no that's not what we did because it's expensive and inefficient and rather silly if you think about it. We got rid of oil lamps altogether and switched to electric lights.
Except for quaint decorative trinkets. If you mean museum piece cars of the future will be dusted off once a year and fueled up with synthetic gasoline, then, sure, maybe somebody with too much money will pay for that. But so what? Gasoline and things that use it and the whole industry that entails will effectively disappear.
Just like we make artificial whale oil for our lamps. Oh, wait, no that's not what we did because it's expensive and inefficient and rather silly if you think about it. We got rid of oil lamps altogether and switched to electric lights.
Except for quaint decorative trinkets. If you mean museum piece cars of the future will be dusted off once a year and fueled up with synthetic gasoline, then, sure, maybe somebody with too much money will pay for that. But so what? Gasoline and things that use it and the whole industry that entails will effectively disappear.
30
@29. Of course. We don't have whale oil lamps, but we have lamps to light our homes.
Golob's scenario is that we don't need to build a tunnel for cars, because we won't have cars. I said we'll still have cars running on alternative fuels, and gas will phase out. The whole point of synthetic gas in my post was not to say we'll continue to have gas cars forever, but that gas cars will fade away as people replace them, not hit a brick wall where they don't exist at all.
And cars, that need tunnels, will still exist as they do now.
Golob's scenario is that we don't need to build a tunnel for cars, because we won't have cars. I said we'll still have cars running on alternative fuels, and gas will phase out. The whole point of synthetic gas in my post was not to say we'll continue to have gas cars forever, but that gas cars will fade away as people replace them, not hit a brick wall where they don't exist at all.
And cars, that need tunnels, will still exist as they do now.
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