Expert Panel's Briefing on Viaduct, 520 and HOV projects

Alaskan Way Viaduct & Seawall Replacement Project and SR 520 Bridge Replacement and HOV Project

Expert Review Panel June 2006

SR 520 Serves as a Critical Transportation and Transit Corridor

SR 520 is a major link between Seattle and the Eastside, with 115,000 vehicles crossing the bridge each day - more than double what the bridge was originally designed to carry
A number of Puget Sound’s largest
employers, including the University of Washington, and key business centers, are

Evergreen Point Landscaped Lid




SR 520 Bridge Replacement and HOV Project


SR 520 Bridge Replacement and HOV Project

What is our implementation
schedule and plan?

Project Schedule


Implementation Plan


• Environmental process

• Design development and approval • Right-of-way

• Construction planning


Implementation Milestones


• Preferred Alternative - Late 2006 • Record of Decision - Early 2008 • Permitting - 2008-2011

• SPCS completed - 2008-2009

• Evergreen Point Bridge construction - 2009-2015 • Corridor construction - 2010-2017


Delivery Strategy

• Early right-of-way acquisition where possible • Advance early design activities during environmental
analysis

• Replace Evergreen Point Bridge first

• Complete corridor construction as funding permits • Proactive risk management

• Keep traffic flowing during construction


Environmental Permitting

Strategies

• Early engagement of resource agencies during
environmental process

• Dedicated staff to streamline process

• Interagency agreements facilitate permit acquisition • Coordination with tribal governments and resource
agencies


Environmental Mitigation

• Sound walls along much of SR 520 in Seattle and the
Eastside

• Stormwater treatment facilities including wetlands, water
quality wet vaults and flow control systems

• Culvert replacement for fish passage • Better traffic operations improving air quality • Improved navigation channel matching I-90 • Both 4-Lane and 6-Lane Alternatives have similar natural
and built environment effects (6-Lane generally more)


Right-of-Way

• Minimize property effects using context sensitive
solutions (CSS)

• Acquire right-of-way early where possible • Disclose property effects early

• Negotiate and acquire right-of-way quickly after record of
decision


Construction Planning

• Construction assumed in three segments:
- Evergreen Point Bridge

- Seattle communities - Eastside communities

• Ongoing planning includes:
- Phasing and sequencing scenarios - Contract planning assessment(s)

- Alternative project delivery and procurement options



Special Projects Construction Site (SPCS)

• SPCS ready for SR 520 construction
by 2009

• The site will be a large plot of land
(at least 30 acres) along a waterfront

Flooding of the graving dock to

• The construction site will be used for

launch Homer Hadley Bridge

pontoons, Blair Waterway, 1981

the SR 520 Bridge pontoons and future WSDOT projects

• The goal is to build the pontoons in at
least three years (8-10 pontoons every six months) to meet the SR 520 Bridge schedule

Hood Canal Bridge pontoon construction site, Concrete Technology, 2006



Bridge Pontoons and Construction

• Up to 55 new pontoons needed for Evergreen Point Bridge • Pontoons will be sized to support future high-capacity transit (HCT) • 4-Lane: 60-foot wide pontoon

What are pontoons?

• 6-Lane: 75-foot wide pontoon

Bridge pontoons are very large hollow concrete structures that are built and outfitted at a construction site, floated to the bridge location, and then pieced together to form a floating bridge. The buoyant pontoons support the bridge structure and roadway above.


Traffic Management

During Construction

• Two lanes of traffic in each direction will be maintained
during construction.

• Night and occasional weekend closures will occur. • New Evergreen Point Bridge will be built to the north of
the existing bridge. This allows the new floating section to be moved into place and anchored without disturbing the existing bridge.

• Specific techniques and plans will be developed to
manage traffic flow and detour routes on local streets.


Cost and Construction Timeframe

Construction

4-Lane 6-Lane Cost *

$1.7 - 2.0 billion
$2.3 - 2.8 Timeframe (years) Proposed start: 2009 - 2010

New bridge open: 2013 - 2015



billion

Estimated

6-Lane with $2.3 - 3.1


construction end:

Options billion


2015 - 2017

* Cost Estimation Validation Process 2005


SR 520 is Vitally Important to the Puget Sound Region

• The SR 520 structures are vulnerable to earthquakes
and windstorms and have a limited remaining life. • Congestion will continue to increase with population
growth - 1.6 million more people by 2040. • SR 520 is a key corridor facilitating economic growth. • The project implementation plan is focused on proactive
risk management.


SR 520 Bridge Replacement and HOV Project
Funding Source
2003 State Nickel Package

2005 State Transportation Partnership Package 2005 Federal Funding

Future Electronic Tolls

Total Identified Funding Needs* Amount $52 million $500 million $1 million $700 million

$1.25 billion
$0.45 - $1.85 billion

* Includes cost of 6-Lane options

Do Car-Pool Lanes Work?

1/7/96

Are highway lanes that require cars to carry more than one passenger, known as high-occupancy-vehicle, or H.O.V., lanes, the solution to congestion, or are they inefficient?

Inbound Only

Most likely, H.O.V. lanes will be underused. It's difficult to arrange to commute with another person in both directions on a regular basis. For example, I could probably find a neighbor willing to leave for work with me each day at 6:30 A.M. However, would this neighbor be willing to work late on the same days that I do? I doubt it. On such days, who pays for gasoline, parking and tolls? Should the neighbor feel slighted by me because the H.O.V. lanes will be off limits on the solo return trip?

Shared return trips are difficult to arrange for those of us with unpredictable schedules; therefore, evening H.O.V. lanes would just reduce the number of available lanes for the majority of motorists, who will be stuck in more traffic, wasting fuel and creating more pollution as they idle.

JACQUES BRAMHALL 4th Montclair

Pattern of Failure

Conceptually flawed from an engineering viewpoint, H.O.V. lanes generally result in inefficient use of highway capacity. Only 50 to 60 percent of the Interstate 80 lane's capacity is being used after 22 months of operation. Meanwhile, the other lanes are jammed to capacity, resulting in substantial slowing of the traffic. Computer modeling described in the I-80 lane feasibility study predicted these conditions.

H.O.V. lanes have been ineffective nationwide. Operating at roughly the same capacity as on its second day, the I-80 lane has continued this pattern of failure.

ERNIE CASNICELLI Flanders

Sharing With a Spouse

I wouldn't want to see the H.O.V. lanes discontinued. Guilty as it makes me feel, my wife and I enjoy using them. We always ride together and I'll wager that most "ride share" folks in the H.O.V. lanes, like us, are also out of the same household and would be traveling together anyway. To prove that H.O.V. lanes do not reduce the numbers of cars on the roads, they need only raise the minimum number of occupants per car to three. Screams will be heard Albany to Trenton.

CARL SPARACIO Ramsey Enforce the Rules

H.O.V. lanes work reasonably well and should be expanded and better enforced. First, two in a car should be sufficient to qualify for the H.O.V. lane. Too often, especially on the tunnel approaches, the requirement is for three. Second, there should be greater enforcement of the rules. Third, we must find more incentives to end one-person driving -- our environmental health is at stake.

ROBERT R. SALMAN Marlboro

The writer is president of the Association for a Better New Jersey.

Can Carpooling Work

Can Better Carpooling Help Fix Our Traffic Mess?
Matt Rosenberg

A recent proposal under Washington State DOT's Trip Reduction Performance Program would utilize a “Flexible Carpooling” strategy in a pilot project for Sea-Tac Airport employees, removing 100 commuter round trips per work day.

Trip Convergence Ltd. is seeking a WSDOT grant of $86,000 over two years to help launch a five-year "proof of concept" test of its user-friendly form of carpooling - described in this YouTube video. (Full disclosure: Cascadia Center is one of several regional entities serving in an advisory capacity to Trip Convergence Ltd. with respect to the above-referenced pilot project).

According to Trip Convergence's grant application to WSDOT, members would drive to a Park and Ride location near Interstate 5 and State Route 18 in Federal Way, where they meet up with other commuters - each person choosing whether to drive or to be a passenger. When a car has one or more additional passengers, the driver then departs for the airport, letting the passenger(s) out at a designated drop off point. In the evening, the process is simply reversed. The application notes:

Participation will be tracked through the use of infrared and radio frequency ID technology, and based on the record of each trip, ride credits will be transferred between riders and drivers. The ride credit received by the driver will entitle the driver to take a ride at a later date.

The system does a good job of addressing the inconvenience that often accompanies carpooling. Rather than wait for a specific group of people, each member rides with the first available vehicle thereby increasing flexibility of when to come into and leave from work. Commuters that often need a car during the day can choose to be drivers, and locating a couple of Flexcars at the airport would also help alleviate the fear of being caught somewhere without a car.

But will it really pencil out, especially with a government grant involved, and compared to more popular forms of alternative commuting, such as bus transit? Let's try to drill down a bit. When a "trip reduction" is tallied, the car is sitting idle not for one day, but for each work day of the calendar year - about 250 days - because the driver is using an alternative form of travel, flexible carpooling in this case. Thus an "annual trip reduced" is really about 250 annual round trips that one car foregoes, or the equivalent spread among several cars.

So, 100 annual round trips reduced - the aim of the Trip Convergence Ltd. pilot project - is really about 25,000 daily round trips, total, reduced per year. At a stated trip reduction cost to WSDOT of $43,000 per year in the project's first two years, the operating subsidy would total a modest $1.72 per daily trip reduced. Factoring in 15 vacation days per year for the owner of each vehicle, 100 annual round trips reduced would total 23,500 daily round trips reduced, and the subsidy would rise to $1.82.

That compares favorably to King County Metro bus service, which as this Metro fact sheet reports, requires $3.64 in operating costs per boarding while simultaneously yielding only 84 cents in operations revenue, for an average operating subsidy of $2.80 per boarding, or $5.60 per daily round trip.

A large part of the difference is likely explained by the unionized salary and benefits costs of operating large public bus fleets and, as off-peak load factors run low, uneconomic fuel costs as well.

One implication is that smaller, more nimble and flexible approaches to group commuting could attract greater market share, especially if regional tolling and transportation-specific carbon taxes, or mileage or cordon fees, are instituted within high-density metropolitan regions. Already, due simply to existing road congestion, we see companies such as Microsoft instituting their own privately-funded regional bus service for employees, which is both salubrious for taxpayers, and in the company's enlightened self-interested, due to its employee retention concerns.

Another implication is that Metro may need to look more closely at serving fewer routes better and faster to improve operating margins. Metro's planned bus rapid transit "rapid ride" corridor routes may provide a useful template for broader stratagic shifts in the system.