Afternoon Fizz: Mercer Rumors

I'm going down to the wooden boat show at South Lake Union just now. I'll park south of Mercer and walk north, crossing Mercer and Valley at intersections with no pedestrian crossing signals.

Wish me luck.

Exactly. Traffic crawls up Denny to I5 as well. So What. Does not justify an improvement project.

Actually, due to all of the years of talkig about the Mercer Mess, the other access points ot I5 have caught up.

See sometimes doing nothing is the best.

I think when the " Mercer Mess" is being referred to, it is the approach to I-5 that is being talked about. At the "right" time of day, traffic just crawls, and if you're a pedestrian you'll be surrounded by idling cars.
Throughout the years, the talk of fixing this was to ease the bottleneck to allow a smoother traffic flow. The proposed fix has been accused of doing nothing to ease the flow but rather simply improve the aesthetics.

WHAT mess? I go by there all the time at all hours. There are much worse messes, some of which only need traffic lighting changes, others that need some manner of traffic rerouting.

The Denny Hill mess. The Madison Valley mess. The route 99 mess (north of downtown). The Rainier Ave. mess. The I-5 mess.

The only thing that is a mess about Mercer is trying to drive north past it to Lake Union. Solvable with light timing.

Or are they talking about how blighted the property along there looks?

I also have to correct myself, after looking more closely at the 2009-10 BTG workplan. I said in an earlier post that the Mercer project was the biggest piece of the Bridging the Gap work, but the Spokane Street project is actually a bit more expensive for the two-year projection period...

This would underscore an important question for the finance/legal folks: If revenue receipts for the BTG program are lagging, to what extent would a single project (in this case, the Mercer revision) be affected, and to what extent would ALL components of the umbrella program be burdened?

BTW, you could also twit DSOT for being very slow to update its web pages for "Bridging the Gap." The last major posting seems to have been in May, when a major environmental signoff came through, and agendas and minutes for the citizens' steering group are now almost a year out of date. It appears that the department isn't providing current information on events germane to the project...not a good sign for Director Crunican's staff.

I think what you mean to say is that REVENUE RECEIPTS under the voter-approved "Bridging the Gap" tax levy program are lagging behind projections.

To the extent that such a revenue shortage specifically applies to the Mercer Project (which is only one of many parts of BTG, albeit the largest one), then the City Council could have to make a decision on whether to APPROPRIATE FUNDS for continued work on the project in the face of insufficient tax receipts.

If this is a 'rumor', when will Publicola's enterprising news staff pick up the phone and call the city finance department to ask probing questions and find out...

* whether tax receipts are truly lagging under BTG?
* the magnitude of the lag?
* what options the city's financial managers have for addressing the problem, other than shrugging their shoulders and dropping it in the Council's lap (e.g., can money be redistributed among budget periods to shift the impact, or are other workarounds available to reduce or eliminate the negative effects)?
* what options SDOT has to shift/rearrange/alter the project work schedule, obviating the need to put the Council back in the spotlight?

I realize that it's a lot easier to pick up a rumor and rush it onto the website than it is to dig a little deeper, make those calls, and put some substance into it...but when Publicola can start doing that, it will be moving in the direction of good, solid news reporting, and some of us will tip our hats to you.

It would have cost 15 million dollars to have saved the waterfront streetcar, with the Port of Seattle offering to pay most of it,but adjacent land wasn't all owned by one particular man who happens to own property both adjacent to the South Lake Union Trolley and the Mercer Street Project.
Can one be a eco friendly progressive politician and still be in the pocket of a billionaire developer?

Nick has been right about the Mercer project all along. That's why I support him for re-election.

another disconnect: when advocating for the Mercer Project, the proponents usually discuss the complete project, west to Elliott Avenue West; this includes significant civil work to widen the undercrossing of SR-99; the $200 million covers the Mercer Project between Dexter Avenue North and I-5 only.

More fodder for whatever populism is out there among current council and mayoral contenders. Hit this (and Nickels) HARD.

Ahem, $30-$50 million

I'm sure they'll start it but not until after the election.

Mercer Street is $30-$50 billion short and we're debating whether or not it's prudent to move forward. The deep bore tunnel project appears to be more than a billion and a half short. I wonder how prudent it is to move forward with that one...