The Alaskan Way Viaduct: How Seattle chose the Bertha tunnel alternative
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- čas přidán 22. 05. 2017
- In April of 2017, Bertha, the massive tunnel-boring machine successfully completed digging a nearly 2 mile deep-bore tunnel under Seattle. The tunnel will carry traffic from the Alaskan Way Viaduct, which had been damaged and deemed seismically unsafe after an earthquake. The tunnel will be much less intrusive than the wall-like Viaduct structure, which cuts Seattle off from its waterfront, and the tunnel, new surface street, and transit will take care of the Viaduct’s 110,000 vehicles per day.Why did Seattle move the highway from above ground to below ground? What we're the replacement options considered? How did Seattle settle on the deep bore tunnel, one of the most expensive options possible, as a replacement for the Viaduct? What was that process like?
Resources on this topic:
Bloomberg: "Stuck in Seattle": www.bloomberg.com/graphics/20...
Seattle Times: "Bertha's woes grind on":
www.seattletimes.com/seattle-n...
Seattle Times: '8-lane highway' on Seattle's waterfront:
www.seattletimes.com/seattle-n...
A special thanks to the Washington State Department of Transportation for the video and many wonderful photos of the project!
Other photo sources:
- Wikimedia Commons
- Flickr user Brad-514
- Flickr user Eric Fidler
- Flickr user Nic McPhee
- Flickr user Oran Viriyincy
- Flickr user Rene Schwietzke
- Flickr user SounderBruce
- Flickr user Stephen Bruce
- Flickr user tdlucas5000
- Flickr user Victor R Ruiz
Imagine if it was this complicated to build in cities skylines.
Not mentioned in the video but very, very important to know. The viaduct or highway 99 is one of only TWO highways through the city. The other is I-5. Both are over capacity during rush hour and frankly near capacity at all other hours. All options other than the bored tunnel would have required them to tear down the Viaduct first and then build the replacement. Which means the city would lose 50% of its highway capacity for years. This was unacceptable.
Something similar was made in Rio de Janeiro. They demolished an elevated highway that blocked the view to the Bay in the downtown area to give space for a walkway with a light rail passing through the middle. They also built a tunnel underneath for the cars. The land value skyrocketed until we remembered we where in the middle of a economic and political crisis that destroyed the country
The so-called "Seattle Process" is normal politics everywhere in the USA - if not the rest of the world - when very large expensive projects occur. Unless the government is a repressive dictatorship, there will be protests galore by all kinds of constituencies in the affected area, with cost usually being the biggest source of complaints. "We can't afford it", "It'll take too long", "There'll be too much construction dust and noise", "My business will be affected", "I don't like it", "We don't need this", blah blah blah. Fortunately, once it's completed and a few years have passed, all that is forgotten.
The last piece of the Alaska Way Viaduct has finally been removed this weekend!
In 1962 when I was a student at the UW College of Architecture, a group of us were given the design project assignment to redevelop the waterfront. Our number one recommendation? Tear down the (just completed) viaduct!
Why is the access to the tunnel at the waterfront...? Why purposely place a traffic jam (or at least high traffic) to a nice waterfront area that also complicates pedestrians' ease of crossing the street? Why not put the access to the downtown side?
incredible how complicated city infrastructure is
Their first mistake was letting the public vote on a complex and expensive project.
As a Seattle resident whos been against the tunnel project for multiple reason you have changed my outlook.
I was just in Seattle (May 2019) and actually drove thru the tunnel. It's actually a pretty long drive and the viaduct is in pieces all over the place with machines picking at it. Here in Washington we've been hearing about this tunnel for damn near 20 yrs so it was cool to finally drive thru it.
As a SF Bay Area resident seeing that Alaskan viaduct gave me chills! The Cypress freeway in Oakland collapsed and killed 40 people in an earthquake in 1989 so we definitely do not miss that type of structure.
Very educational! I was obtaining my civil engineering degree at the time and we had a lot of discussions about the Alaskan Way Viaduct alternatives in our transportation engineering classes. A huge majority had voted against the tunnel option and went for the surface option, similar to San Francisco. However, even though we now see the pitfalls of the tunnel option as well as the cost, I am happy with the uniqueness this brings to Seattle's infrastructure. From floating bridges to megatunnels in a seismic zone, Seattle can claim itself to be one of the most technically challenging areas to design for. It is exciting to be an engineer in this area.
They just closed down the Alaska way viaduct last weekend (Jan 11, 2019) for the final time.
Its like one of those groups projects, where everyone wants to do their own thing, and the final result is a Frankenstein.
Makes me grateful for the Roman Street layout in York - no space to build anything like this and is now all pedestrianised thank god 😀
For me, as an urban planning student, this is the ideal channel. Love it!
'The Seattle process' - sounds like planning in the Netherlands
You should do a video on the Big Dig
Here in Liverpool UK, they're still talking about how to reconnect the city to the waterfront after 30 years. We've actually gone backwards. Don't know why, watching this, it looks easy (!).