Late last year, we reported on SDOT‘s plan to replace the SW Thistle stairway in Upper Fauntleroy. At the time, the work was expected to be done this year. Now, project manager Greg Funk says it won’t happen before next year:

We’re now planning to replace this stairway in 2018. We had originally scheduled this stairway replacement to happen this year, but our engineering cost estimates came in too high for our maintenance crews to construct (the steep hillside and narrow right of way add to the project scope). This means we need to go through a formal design and bidding process. We are also going to look at the possibility of rehabbing the existing stairway rather than doing a full tearout and replacement.

Two other updates – first, a survey:

Our 2018 stairway survey is now live. This map shows the stairways we’ve prioritized for improvements in 2018. The survey closes on July 10, 2017 and we will use the input to inform design and better communicate with the stairway neighbors during construction.

You can answer that survey by going here – note that it includes three West Seattle stairways, two in the north, one in the south. And we have one other update:

Update on SW Holly St & Beveridge Pl SW: This stairway was scheduled for replacement last year; however, there were concerns about the project, so we have decided to re-hab this stairway and put it on our list of stairways that we will keep for historic purposes. We will reset the existing stairway and upgrade the wood rail to standard steel rail. We may have time to complete this work in 2017, if not 2018.