Seattle Is About to Be Bored

[from 7/21/10]

So, we’re about to have a tunnel project!

A boring tunnel machine is going to nuzzle his way two miles through our city’s underparts and I couldn’t be more excited! I will pay whatever it takes in taxes to see that try to happen.

This is much better than wasting my money on beer, or strippers, or ending homelessness. None of those things can ever satisfy me like the slow-motion creation of a vast sideways pit to pour cars through, under, past Seattle, and out of sight.

Some people are still saying it’s a bad idea to build the tunnel to replace the viaduct, but those are sad ignorant people who don’t understand how bad the alternatives are. To help them I will run through the alternatives now, so they can begin to grasp the fact that the tunnel is the best of all possible solutions to the viaduct replacement problem as well as I do.

Alternative 1. Fill in Elliott Bay, pave it, and make it a giant “all ways, all times” intersection. This solution would shut up those folks always squawking about the “decaying sea wall”. It also would provide a great place for teens to practice their driving, and it would be a hell of a tourist destination, akin to the Bonneville Salt Flats. Great, except for one thing: Potholes. We couldn’t afford the maintenance.

Alternative 2. The whole point of the viaduct is connect what’s south of downtown to what’s north of downtown, right? So what if we just got rid of one of those, quietly, in the middle of the night? I tried to work the details out on this one but got stuck on some seriously fatal legal issues. Also: There’s no such thing as “quietly” when it comes to West Seattleites or to Magnolian hordes.

Alternative 3. We make downtown Seattle so attractive no one will want to pass through. Mayor McGinn is getting on track toward this goal with his vision of Seattle as a 24-hour bar-hopping Mecca. But let’s face it, years of making downtown Seattle inhospitable to homeless people have had the side effect that it’s also that much less welcoming to anybody who can’t shell out hundreds a day to amuse themselves. You’d need to install benches and public rest rooms, etc. It’ll never happen.

Alternative 4. Ferry cars across the bay. Ha! Stupid, stupid idea! Putting cars on boats and floating them from place to place? Get real. Besides, ferries cost money, unlike magically free state-built tunnels.

Alternative 5. We take Seattle apart and put it back together someplace where it won’t be in our way anymore. Paul Allen could figure out how to get us to pay for that with our own money while somehow making himself richer, and then ingratiate himself to us by giving back half of the profits our money netted him. The only drawback to this one is Seattle would find out what it’s like when nobody wants you in their backyard.

Alternative 6. This is the very attractive idea to accept the tunnel idea whole, except for the tunnel part. In other words, you don’t build the tunnel, but you charge people the same amount in tolls to drive through the city as you were going to charge them to use the tunnel. This will so reduce the traffic through the city that no viaduct replacement will be necessary.

I have to admit that it was really hard to find the downside to Alternative 6. But here goes: Seattle, see, has this undeserved reputation for being one of the friendliest cities in the country. Those of us who live here know that’s nonsense. We’re the passive aggressive capital of the world. We love to give visitors directions, to the airport. We’re courteous to a fault, and that fault is ready to slip at a moments provocation.

We can’t afford to blow our cover. If the world finds out how unfriendly we really are, who will buy our condos?