Seattle Still Debating Design Plans For A Project To Rebuild Its Crumbling Downtown Seawall

In the recent aftermath of Hurricane Sandy’s devastating destruction on the East Coast of the United States, citizens in the City of Seattle on the West Coast have decided to take preventative measures to make sure the same thing doesn’t happen to them – they just haven’t hammered out all the details yet!

The Elliot Bay Seawall (also called the Alaskan Way Seawall) originally being built in 1934. Photo courtesy of the Seattle Department of Transportation.

Earlier this month, Seattle residents overwhelmingly approved city funding for a new seawall for the city’s downtown district.

On Election Night, 77 percent of Seattle residents voted in support of the seawall measure – also known as Proposition 1 – to approve “a $290 million, 30-year bond measure and excess property tax levy for the purpose of replacing the Alaskan Way Seawall and associated infrastructures, including city-owned waterfront piers,” says the project’s budget legislation fiscal notes.

For years, city officials had been trying to gain public support to finance the project, warning of the danger of the now heavily deteriorating seawall.

The day of the vote, Seattle Councilmember Tom Rasmussen, chair of the council’s transportation committee, urged citizens to pass the measure in a statement telling them that the “aging seawall” had been considered vulnerable to an earthquake collapse ever since the Nisqually earthquake hit Washington State in 2001.

The Nisqually earthquake was one of the state’s largest quakes on record, registered at a 6.8 and lasting about 45 seconds. The Nisqually earthquake violently shook the Puget Sound region from Olympia to Everett 10 years ago, caused roughly $2 billion in damage, injured 400 people and was blamed for one fatal heart attack, said The Olympian in 2011 on the 10-year anniversary of the quake.

Rasmussen warned voters that if the seawall collapses it will have “grave effects” on the businesses, utilities, and roads along the waterfront and into downtown Seattle.

An even more graphic picture was illustrated in the project’s legislative fiscal notes, saying:

The existing Alaskan Way Seawall was not designed to withstand earthquakes and has been structurally weakened due to tidal forces (of Elliot Bay), aging materials and marine borer damage. There is a one in ten chance of an earthquake leading to liquefaction and seawall failure, within the next ten years.

Failure of the seawall could disrupt public transportation and utilities, damage regional commerce and potentially lead to loss of life.

In addition, Pier 58 and 62/63, which are publicly owned, have reached dangerous levels of deterioration. Pier 58 is seismically vulnerable, and Pier 62/63 is structurally compromised to the degree that limited physical activity is now permitted.

“Approximately 50 percent of the existing wall (is) currently damaged,” says the project’s ordinance.

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