This item was originally posted yesterday. State Sen. Ed Murray weighed in today, so we’ve updated it (again) and moved it up. PubliCola had a conversation with state House speaker Frank Chopp yesterday about the upcoming legislative session. When we asked him whether Seattle Mayor-Elect Mike McGinn’s opposition to the downtown tunnel would shift the debate about the tunnel in Olympia, Chopp chuckled. “Mayor-Elect McGinn and I have both been in agreement opposed to the tunnel. We don’t think it’s a good idea. That’s one of the topics we decided to talk about the next time we get together. ...

Interesting story in The Seattle Times this morning about the emergence of a 2007 Alaskan Way Viaduct earthquake simulation and whether the timing of its delayed release is in any way related to next week's mayoral election. From Jim Brunner's story: The state kept that video secret until Sunday night, when it granted an exclusive airing to [...]

This morning, seattletimes.com (WSB partner) follows up on the WSDOT Viaduct-earthquake-simulation video release with a few more tidbits, including the price tag - which many asked about in comments here and elsewhere after the video started making the rounds Sunday night: $80,000. The Times story also questions why the video turned up “first” on a KING5 newscast - though it does not mention what we pointed out here Sunday night: WSDOT actually published the video to YouTube on Friday (which you can verify through Google Video Search, as well as the datestamp on the ...

Five prominent supporters of the plan to replace the Alaskan Way Viaduct with a deep-bored tunnel and other road/transit projects summoned reporters to Ivar’s Acres of Clams on the downtown waterfront today, saying they needed to correct “falsehoods,” “confusion” and “mis-impressions” that they say are circulating. They blame the “falsehoods” in particular on some political campaigns, specifically citing the campaigns of two anti-tunnel candidates, mayoral hopeful Mike McGinn (who calls the tunnel “unnecessary”) and council hopeful Mike O’Brien (whose tunnel concerns are detailed here). First, the group pointed to the numbers ...

As this weekend winds down, another reminder about next weekend: The Alaskan Way Viaduct will be closed 6 am Saturday-6 pm Sunday (10/18-10/19) for its semiannual inspection. (And if that in turns detours you to the 1st Avenue South exit for the first time in a while, remember that as of a month ago, you have to turn left - north - there.)

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It’s drawn the most support at West Seattle public meetings about what will replace the “central waterfront” section of The Viaduct, which the state vows to take down 2012 no matter what — but the possible option shown above, a retrofit, is one of three options now totally out of the running, according to a state/city/county briefing this afternoon, presented by these three government representatives (left to right, Bob Powers from the city, Ron Paananen from the state, and Ron Posthuma from the county/Metro). We liveblogged the briefing in detail here; ...

Eight Viaduct replacement ideas on the table KING5.com, WA - 7 hours ago ... but another calls for using deep tunnel boring technology under downtown, like that used by Sound Transit building the new light rail line.

We’re still working on our summary of the briefing we liveblogged earlier - where state/city/county reps presented the 8 “scenarios” now under consideration to replace the “central waterfront” section of the Alaskan Way Viaduct - but in the meantime, we wanted to let you know the meeting materials including artist renderings have just been posted online; find them here (look for Scenario A through Scenario H). Share This

(3:13 pm note, the briefing is now over - all notes below - we will write into a summary later.) We’re downtown, 24th floor of the Wells Fargo Building (view above is from the briefing room), headquarters of the Alaskan Way Viaduct and Seawall Replacement Program, for the briefing on the Alaskan Way Viaduct progress so far - will post notes here as it goes. NOTES: 8 possible scenarios identified so far … A-C surface, D-E above ground solutions, F-H are below ground “SR 99 components.” No longer any 6 lane replacements in the solutions ...

The debate about Seattle's Alaskan Way Viaduct used to be a very public, contact sport, but as many local politicians were carted off the field, the controversy moved to a 30-person stakeholders group, who meet very quietly. Meanwhile, the politicians edge back onto the playing field and hint at solutions.