Future of Alaskan Way Viaduct Under Study Again

The 60-foot-high, 40-foot-wide, double-decked roadway that carries 107,000 vehicles a day along downtown Seattle’s western flank has been a part of the city’s waterfront for longer than most locals can remember.

As a visible and audible barrier to the waterfront, however, the Alaskan Way viaduct is hard to forget. As a result, State officials are studying ways to improve or eliminate the structure. Legislators included money for the study in the current state budget to address growing concerns about the viaduct’s stability and its effect on growth in the city’s core.Today, the state Transportation Commission will be briefed on the study’s progress. When it is completed in mid-2002, the document is supposed to show whether the span should be retrofitted, replaced or simply torn down.

Up for discussion today are several possibilities, including simply tearing down the viaduct, without replacing it, at a cost estimated at $118 million in a 1996 study; retrofitting it so it could better withstand earthquakes, at a cost of nearly $344 million; building a new, more earthquake-resistant span, for $530 million; building ramps to a new or retrofitted viaduct to link it to Mercer and Spokane streets; and finding ways to increase its traffic-handling capacity, or to re-route traffic if it is closed.