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Comment by icelancer | Hacker News Reader

Pretty cool how a project that took 10+ years to agree on is going to make traffic worse in the 4th most congested metropolitan area in the US and cost 2-5x as much. All around a fine bureaucratic job by everyone involved.

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Well one alternative floated was to simply to demolish the unsafe viaduct with no replacement, as San Francisco did with the Embarcadero Freeway after the '89 earthquake. My preferred alternative, and much cheaper! However that wasn't a popular suggestion, probably because it would be worse for traffic (at least in the medium-term), especially given Seattle's not-great public transit. Another alternative is to rebuild the viaduct, which would be cheaper than a tunnel but still very expensive, and would probably require it to be closed in the interim anyway, because it basically needs a complete replacement of the unsound 1950s structure, not just more reinforcement. Or, of course, keep the viaduct as is and hope there aren't any major earthquakes...

> Seattle's not-great public transit

I like Seattle's public transit. As for the tunnel, how about giving the right-of-way to Sound Transit and let them build the Ballard/West Seattle rail route through there? They seem to be doing quite well at digging tunnels pretty much everywhere.

What there is of Seattle's transit is good. The problem is that coverage is poor, it relies too heavily on buses (I'd love some more comprehensive regional rail...) and the buses are over capacity and underfunded. Otherwise it is sanitary (some other cities seem to have trouble keeping feces off of everything, but Seattle does well there) and often on time.

Seattle Transit Blog had a post that touched on that topic. (which I can't find) I think the reason to not do that is that the tunnel is too deep so you would not have stations downtown since the cost of each station is more then a transit only tunnel.

As for the last option, the viaduct is sinking, if it sinks too much they'll be forced to close it and it's already nearly half of the way there. So even if we tossed earthquake safety out the window the viaduct realistically doesn't have a long lifetime ahead of it.

I agree, that would definitely be the best option. The money could've been allocated to transit improvements which would likely diffuse some of the congestion growth. $3bn would buy you an awful lot of transit.

> Seattle's not-great public transit

I've visited Seattle, but I live in Lexington, Kentucky, and believe me, it could be a lot worse.

See also the Edinburgh tram system. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edinburgh_Trams

http://bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-27602618

It cost twice as much as predicted (probably more); has less network than originally planned; caused massive disruption to locals; etc.

When the opening ceremony is described (by Edinburgh City Council chief executive Sue Bruce):

> "It's not a day for jubilation," she told BBC Breakfast.

> "I think the whole of Edinburgh is relieved that the programme is now in place and the city can move on."

... then you know the project isn't the sucess that people wanted.

Yup. As a Seattle area resident it's been frustrating watching this clusterfuck play out in slow motion to the tune of billions in costs. The deep bore tunnel was the most expensive and riskiest of all the options to replace the viaduct. For a while there was hope, but it turned out to be just as much of a shitshow as most detractors imagined. The tunnel was supposed to have been open to traffic sometime in 2015. Now 2015 is when they will finally be able to dig down to the TBM so they can extract the cutting head in order to repair it, and then maybe sometime after that they can return to digging.

> is going to make traffic worse

Is it? According to some, making more lanes makes traffic worse, according to some others, making less lanes makes traffic worse, so which is it? Can you ever make traffic less worse?

In those studies that show removing a lane can improve traffic flow or adding a lane can worsen traffic, that is only true of particular lanes/roads in different areas. In fact, it is more than likely that removing any one lane from any road is more likely to worsen traffic than it is to improve it.

It is entirely dependent on the network patterns of the traffic flow itself, not the roads.

In general, anything that encourages people to drive their own cars in cities makes traffic worse. Blocking roads can improve traffic but annoys people.

Congestion taxes, higher parking fees, improved or cheaper public transport can all make traffic better, but the first two will annoy people.

Or self-driving cara eventually.

And replace a public road with a toll road, with effects that are predictable. Strange saga.

Is there good public transport in Seattle?

Seattle voters brought this upon themselves, ultimately. Although, I voted against the tunnel and am still pissed about it.

http://ballotpedia.org/Seattle_Viaduct_Tunnel_Replacement_Qu...

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