Take 21 » SR 520

What’s Your Question for City Councilmembers?

Nicole — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 18:03:58 +0000

Call 206-684-8821 or email your questions now for Councilmembers Jean Godden, Bruce Harrell and Tim Burgess on this month’s edition of City Inside/Out: Council Edition. The show premieres Wednesday, February 24, 7p.m. Cable 21.

Do you have questions for Seattle City Councilmembers? How does the Council want to handle the City’s 2011 $50 million budget deficit? What are their thoughts on a solution for rebuilding the State Route 520 bridge? How do they feel the search for a new Seattle Police Chief search is going? This episode of City Inside/Out: Council Edition features Seattle City Council Finance and Budget Chair Jean Godden, Public Safety Chair Tim Burgess and Energy and Technology Chair Bruce Harrell answering your questions.

Whatever your question is, if you want it answered on TV, you have to call 206-684-8821 or email contact@seattlechannel.org. Host C.R. Douglas will also raise the key issues facing Seattle. You can also submit your questions or watch past episodes by visiting the City Inside/Out: Council Edition website, http://www.seattlechannel.org/CouncilEdition/.

Don’t miss this opportunity to put your issues before the City’s lawmakers! Call or email right now! Then tune in Wednesday, February 24 at 7 p.m. on SEATTLE CHANNEL, Cable 21, to get answers.

State Legislature opens

george — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 15:00:38 +0000

On January 11, the Washington State Legislature convenes. City Inside/Out host C.R. Douglas and his team have put together a multi-story package to inform you about the upcoming session. First, the Speaker of the State House of Representatives Frank Chopp discusses how Democrats will deal with a looming $2.6 billion deficit. For Chopp, the first budget priority is closing tax loopholes. “The key about these loopholes is that you need to make a real careful judgment call. Is this tax loophole more important than this important program, like public schools or school construction or health care for kids or help for the disabled?” asks Chopp. Then Seattle City Council President Richard Conlin lays out the City of Seattle’s legislative agenda in Olympia. In the third part of our show, Seattle legislators–37th District State Senator Adam Kline, 36th District State Senator Jeanne Kohl-Welles and 46th District State Representative Scott White–share their priorities for this year’s session. The decisions at the state level will affect Seattle all year long—so don’t miss this chance to learn about what’s going on in Oly!

Replacing the 520 Bridge

george — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 16:20:01 +0000

This week on City Inside/Out, we take up the issue of replacing the State Route 520 bridge.

State government says it’s necessary to spend up to $4.6 billion to replace the bridge and its corridor between Seattle and Bellevue. The bridge opened in 1963 and the state has determined the structure is nearing the end of its life. Recently, a key group of legislators, including state House Transportation Chair Judy Clibborn, endorsed the so-called “A+” plan to replace the bridge and reconfigure traffic in the Montlake neighborhood. The plan includes building a second drawbridge over the Montlake Cut in addition to a new six-lane span over Lake Washington. The plan would also continue to provide access to and from the bridge via Lake Washington Boulevard that transverses the Washington Park Arboretum.

Rep. Clibborn says, The “‘A+’ [plan] is what we can pay for.” She also adds that she is confident that a new drawbridge will be able to be permitted in an extremely environmentally sensitive area—the Montlake Cut that provides the only passage for fish that migrate from Puget Sound to Lake Washington.

“A+ is dead on arrival,” responds the Coalition for a Sustainable 520’s Jonathan Dubman. “The A+ plan…runs the table on doing everything wrong from one end of this corridor to the other…It doesn’t fix the problems and it causes new ones.” Dubman would prefer a tunnel that goes under the Montlake Cut and allows bridge traffic to and from the north to bypass the Montlake neighborhood entirely.

The Arboretum Foundation’s Paige Miller says, “The plans simply favor concrete over parks, none of them address our concerns.” Miller stresses that a new 520 bridge should no longer use Lake Washington Boulevard as “a long on-and-off ramp for 520.” Instead she wants to see strong traffic calming measures–perhaps even tolling the Boulevard–to discourage vehicles from going through the Arboretum.

$500 million pontoons

george — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 13:44:10 +0000

On June 22, 2009, the Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) began the process of identifying a contractor to build 33 concrete pontoons for a new State Route 520 bridge. WSDOT plans to hire a contractor for the $300-$500 million project by December 31, 2009. The contractor will “design and construct a new pontoon casting and launching facility” as well as build the pontoons themselves, according to WSDOT. WSDOT specifies that the new pontoon facility must be located in Grays Harbor county on Washington’s coast. The pontoons themselves will be massive—21 of them will be 360 feet long by 75 feet wide by 28.5 feet deep, according to WSDOT. In April, the State Legislature authorized tolls to pay to replace the SR 520 bridge project including the cost of the new pontoons. The state Transportation Commission will set the starting date and the amount of the tolls.

Legislature approves tolling for SR 520 bridge

george — Sun, 03 May 2009 12:06:53 +0000

In April 2009, the Washington State Legislature approved tolls on the SR 520 bridge in order to raise money for the structure’s replacement. House Bill 2211 directs the Washington State Transportation Commission to set the amount of the tolls and to vary them by time of day, according to the final bill report prepared by non-partisan legislative staff.

In addition, the bill caps the cost of the bridge replacement at $4.65 billion. It does not, however, make decisions about which design alternative should be pursued. Instead, it creates the SR 520 Work Group that will report back to the legislature by January 1, 2010 on its recommendations for design and financing of the project. The SR 520 Work Group is comprised of 12 legislators mostly from districts that have some part of the bridge within their geographical boundaries-including State House Speaker Frank Chopp (D-Seattle), House Transportation Chair Judy Clibborn (D-Mercer Island), Senator Ed Murray (D-Seattle) and Senator Rodney Tom (D-Medina)-and Washington State Secretary of Transportation Paula Hammond.

The cost of commuting across SR520 could add up

george — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 12:08:24 +0000

Commuters across the SR520 floating bridge may have to shell out $10 just to get across. That’s the current toll estimate from the January 29 House Transportation Committee Hearing in Olympia.

Based on the proposal, the round-trip tolls of the new Evergreen Point bridge would range from $5.66 to $8.13 in today’s dollars and $6.90 to $9.90 when the new bridge is expected to open in 2015. Official estimate it could take over 40 years to finish funding the bridge.

The latest cost estimate for the new bridge is $4.38 billion. The Legislature agreed to fund $552 million and the Regional Transportation Investment District $1.1 billion if voters consent to a tax increase that will raise $8.5 billion for several road projects.

However, even with that funding the project is still $2.7 billion less than the estimated cost.

One state lawmaker said they have to respond to the overwhelming cost of the SR520 project this session.