19 Replies to “U-Link Update: Dec 2011”

  1. Has work begun on the UW station? Also, with the Husky stadium being rebuilt. Are there plans to build around the station there? Maybe some commercial?

    1. Work cannot ramp up until the TBM’s are completed. My guess that won’t be until a few months after the TBM’s are finished.

      1. BB,

        ST publishes a summary of construction progress on their period project updates. Look under “Construction at a glance” at the bottom of the page:

        http://projects.soundtransit.org/x7374.xml

        It lists Husky Station as 74.33% excavated and 16.84% for Station construction. Cap Hill is at 100% excavated and 0% construction.

        Now if we could just get ST to improve that silly tunneling progress graphic…..

      2. 16.84% sounds extremely precise (not 16 or 17?). Does anyone have any where this number might be coming from?

      3. Oran — ST has lately been publishing monthly Link progress reports, available at that same link you gave.

        Eric — Precision is not the same as accuracy. From the Nov 2012 Link Progress Report (page 5):

        Note: The overall construction progress above is based on a weighted combination of duration, schedule and cost % complete for individual construction contracts as compared to the overall U-Link construction contracts.

        Obviously they can compute the percent done to four significant digits, but that’s not really meaningful. Note that they reported Husky station %complete in the progress report as 17%, but the tunnel %comple numbers to 1 decimal place. The tunneling contracts are simple to schedule at this stage because they’ll consist of mobilization, the actual boring, and demobilization (plus moving the TBM back to CHS and reassembling it in the case of Brenda). Mobilization has already happened, so they know how long that took and they know where the TBMs are to the centimeter, so estimating progress is pretty straightforward.

        Station construction is more complicated and is at an earlier stage, so it can’t be estimated so well. Of course, unforseen difficulties could slow things down, and it may not be that the contracts are not that far along in time alone.

  2. I think in the next update ST should have the south bleachers partially demolished in the info graphic.

    1. In the winter of 1925, long after this Gold Rush boomtown on the Bering Sea had gone bust, diphtheria swept through its population of 1,400.

      How many gallons of oil did Nome need per capita in 1925? AK is thought of as the ultimate “individual responsiblity” state (alright… MT, ID, and ND may want to dispute that) but this is a state that pays it’s citizens rather than collects taxes because of it’s immense oil wealth. It’s a facinating story; especially since it involves a Russia tanker… Seward’s folly?

  3. Does anyone know if the stub tunnel after UW station will be long enough for more than 2 car trains?

    1. I don’t know the answer to this (I suspect it is no), but if the motivation for your question is to find out if ST can run 4-car trains then I think the real answer is yes.

      I assume that UW Station will operate the way Sea-Tac/Airport Station does today, with trains laying over at the platform before making the return trip. Unlike at Westlake, there’s no need for the trains to depart the platform after unloading to make way for buses. I don’t think a stub tunnel is necessary for operations, though there will be one to provide room to remove the TBMs coming from North Link construction.

      1. Good point – I hadn’t thought of that. So there will be a track switchover *before* the UW station platforms to allow trains to end up on the appropriate track, and a somewhat minimal stub for when the TBMs from the north break through.

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