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The first online-only news site in state history to get media credentials to cover the state capitol and Seattle city hall, PubliCola has been called a “must-read” by the Seattle Post Intelligencer and a hot “New Media Mover and Shaker” by Seattle Magazine—which also cited our own Erica C. Barnett as the city's No. 1 news nerd.

McGinn Urges Council to Support His Plan for Rail on 520

City Hall, Politics   April 9, 2010 at 11:38 am Erica C. Barnett

As we noted in today’s Morning Fizz, Mayor Mike McGinn took issue with my reporting on the fact that a wider new 520 bridge designed to accommodate light rail could conceivably be converted into an eight-lane bridge for cars instead. Yesterday, I met with him in his office, where he sketched out his vision for a new 520 bridge—and explained why he believes his plan couldn’t be converted into eight general-purpose lanes for cars.

McGinn doesn’t dispute that eight lanes would technically be possible on a wider bridge (a possibility that Nelson/Nygaard consultant Tim Payne confirmed at a public hearing on the 520 options at council chambers yesterday evening). However, he argues that it would also be possible to build eight lanes on the narrower bridge supported by the state and a majority of the city council, by narrowing the shoulders and shrinking a proposed bike lane. “My question is, why won’t the city council stand up for light rail over 520 … and will they stick with red-herring arguments about things that also apply to their plan?”

That’s true, but the fact remains that a wider bridge would make it much easier to restripe eight lanes—either by reducing the outside shoulders to eight feet (there’s precedent for that on I-90, where shoulders are planned at between six to eight feet)—than a narrower one. If the bridge was 115 feet wide, as in the state’s preferred six-lane alternative, the shoulders would have to be much smaller than standard—probably around three to four feet. Shoulders that narrow wouldn’t allow cars to pull off the road, and as far as I know, building a new bridge with such narrow shoulders is pretty much unprecedented.

McGinn also said that, because the two center 520 lanes in his plan would have to separate from the main bridge structure over Foster Island, they could never be converted into general-purpose lanes—they’d have to be dedicated to bus-rapid transit or light rail.

“I think [the council is] concerned that it’s not possible to do better than what’s been proposed” by the state,” McGinn said. “I think if Seattle stands together and says we want this bridge to be designed to accommodate light rail, we have a chance of getting other leaders in the region to respond to our concerns. But if we don’t stand together, there’s a strong possibility that we’re going to get a bad alternative pushed through our city.”




  • seadog

    Very correctly in the ST it has been pointed out that the loss of the HOV lanes would mean the buss traffic would be pushed into the other lanes, as well as car pools. It is over-simplistic, paid for consultant studies like McGinns that are suspect and should be avoided at such a late date.

    A point not taken is what will the Eastside communities will do if faced with light rail traffic in the proposed corridor – anyone care to take on Medina, Bellevue, Yarrow Bay? This issue involves more than Seattle.

  • Brent

    Why can't we convert one of the general-purpose lanes each way to HOV? Wouldn't that deal with all the eastside merge issues?

    Also, SR 520 east of the lake is being rebuilt in a manner much more suitable for light rail. Just watch the videos, with all the under-lid transit stations.

    http://www.wsdot.wa.gov/Projects/SR520Bridge/Li…

    It's not like buses will have an easy time exiting from that design. It looks more likely that people will go up an elevator from the transit station, and hop on a bus that serves the main street going over the lid.

    It looks like the eastside design was thought out much better than the westside design, especially for transit.

    We need that separate transit exit into Husky Stadium Station, even if it is never converted into light rail. Building that separate exit will enable the freeway to go down to four lanes at Montlake. The only thing west of Montlake that really needs rebuilt are columns that could collapse in an earthquake.

    If we leave SR 520 as only four lanes between Montlake and I-5, the engineering of pushing eight lanes into four lanes would be engineering and politically infeasible.

    BTW, I love it that the mayor met with Erica, but gives the cold shoulder to business lobbyists pretending to be journalists.