Month: August 2009

Something that has frustrated me recently is the theme I hear from some politicians and commenters who say that the debate over the SR-99 tunnel replacement for the Viaduct is over. After all, our leaders decided back in January that we’d have a tunnel. This continued bickering is just another example of the Seattle Process.

When “bickering” reaches the point of a serious primary challenge, though, that means the debate isn’t over. Far from it.

When McGinn came to the blog meet-up last week, I was moved by some of his populist appeals. Politicians don’t tell us when the debate is over. They don’t threaten to withhold state money to get their way. They don’t move the city in a direction that we don’t want them to. That’s not their job. We don’t answer to them, they answer to us. I’ll admit, McGinn’s stump speech struck a chord with me.

It’s true that transit advocates should worry gravely about McGinn’s misplaced softness on rail transit (he’s wrong, it can’t wait). And it’s true that opposing a tunnel doesn’t mean that McGinn will be a functional mayor. We can argue his candidacy, but we can’t argue that he has renewed discussion about the tunnel and whether it’s really the agreement that Seattle should be a party to. How can one see an image like this and think the debate’s over?

by AMBER CAMPBELL, editor, Rainier Valley Post

[Ed. Note: Cross-posted at RVP.  We know you’re looking for excuses to ride Link, so here’s something for you to do.  Previously: the Mt. Baker Walking Tour.]

Columbia City – a historic community tracing back to 1889 – was a separate city until Seattle annexed it in 1907. Now it’s the gem of the Rainier Valley with improvements that have given the district a turn-of-the-century look while creating even more hometown appeal.

For the station hugger, Rainier Vista neighbor and Seattle Transit Blog editor Martin Duke recommends the pan-Asian fast-food joint Maki & Yaki – just one-third of a mile north of the the Columbia City station on Martin Luther King Jr. Way. “It’s really inexpensive with a broad selection,” he said.

Indeed, Maki & Yaki serves teriyaki (beef, chicken and pork), sweet & sour chicken and pork, short ribs, some seafood plates and assorted sushi rolls, all in a bright, clean setting for less than $10 a plate.

Meanwhile, the urban explorer will want to head two long blocks east on South Edmunds Street from the station to the historic Columbia City business district on Rainier Avenue South, which boasts an eclectic mix of retailers, restaurants and entertainment options.

More after the jump. Continue reading “Columbia City Station Guide”

[UPDATE 2: Apparently the McGinn plan is not exactly the WSDOT surface/transit plan.]

[UPDATE: As commenter Chris points out (and confirmed in the report), the $200m in savings on Moving Forward is actually due to putting less money into the Battery St. tunnel and the viaduct North of Lenora St.  Most or all of this money would have to be put back in for the Surface/Transit option.  This reduces the Surface/Transit option savings to roughly $100m-300m plus overruns.  We’re still peeling the onion.]

I just chatted with Kadeena Lenz of WSDOT, who pointed me to this report (pdf).  The Moving Forward project cost has dropped from $1.1 billion to $900m due to some unanticipated savings from not having to redo the Battery Street tunnel; of that, $300m is supposed to come from the Port of Seattle, and $600m from the State.

McGinn doesn’t include port contributions in the budget, so I think it’s fair to score this as a $600m $800m shortfall in his budget plans, not $1.1 billion.  (Split the difference!).  To get his surface/transit plan, delete the $1.9 billion tunnel from the chart above, add $553m for I-5 improvements, about $170m for transit, and about $200m more for local roads.  Then remove $400m in tolling, and you get a little under $600m $800m not covered by the State, the feds, or the Port of Seattle.

Oddly, aside from the moving forward issue, McGinn’s cost estimates for surface/transit are about $175m higher than Nickels, so you can give him credit for that difference if you like.  It also has to be said that the cost overrun risk is lower for surface/transit than the tunnel.

The bottom line: assuming the State and Port are willing to spend $2.7 billion no matter what, surface/transit is cheaper for the City and County by $300m-$500m $100m-$300m, but it isn’t free.

Mike McGinn has a response to the yesterday’s Nickels challenge.  He identifies the funding sources and sketches out a $2.4 billion budget for surface/transit that fits the revenue.  That’s more than you can say for the deep-bore tunnel, which is currently roughly $1 billion short in identified sources.

The Nickels campaign identified the surface/transit total cost as $3.5 billion.  Looking at the chart, it appears the key discrepancy is that Nickels includes $1.1 billion for “Moving forward” projects (the work already underway on the North and South ends.)

It’ll take some more digging to resolve the discrepancy.

There’s a whole McGinn-Nickels spat right now over the deep-bore tunnel, one that has a few more hard numbers than usual.  Dominic Holden at Slog has the best rundown of those numbers.

To summarize, Nickels has numbers showing that the surface/transit option costs the City $936m — slightly more than the deep-bore tunnel ($930m plus overruns), because the State would reduce its contribution in accordance with the $700m difference in cost.*

McGinn has the beginnings of a good response here, but its validity depends on three ultimately empirical questions**:

1. To what extent can State gas tax money be diverted to those $936m in costs under the Constitution?

2. Is the “City pays for overruns” thing enforceable or not?  I haven’t heard a legal opinion from anyone without a direct stake in the viaduct fight.

3. Could McGinn negotiate a better deal with the State?

Perhaps a legal mind better than mine can answer the first two of these questions. Kerry Murakami of the Post-Globe attempts to answer the third by asking some State legislators.

*Partly because the anticipated $400m from tolling would evaporate.

**Assuming the Nickels numbers aren’t shown to be inaccurate.